Democracy Now! - Hugo Chavezhttp://www.democracynow.org/topics/hugo_chavez
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144144Democracy Now! - Hugo Chavezen-USDemocracy Now! - Hugo ChavezEcuadorean Foreign Minister on Latin American Resistance to NSA Spying & the Castro-Chávez Legacyhttp://www.democracynow.org/2013/9/24/ecuadorean_foreign_minister_on_latin_american
tag:democracynow.org,2013-09-24:en/story/efa99b
AMY GOODMAN : Why is President Correa not addressing the U.N. General Assembly like so many world leaders are?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] President Correa doesn&#8217;t have a lot of expectations about what is said in the meetings of the General Assembly. He attended one General Assembly and addressed the hall, but there were no world leaders in the room at the time to hear what he had to say. It seems like only the first speeches are given importance, and the rest... So, there&#8217;s concern about the methodology of how things are organized here. And since he had the experience that he had here in the U.N., he was, quite frankly, just frustrated, and he&#8217;s not really interested in participating in an event where nobody really seems to be interested in hearing each other.
AMY GOODMAN : Foreign Minister, what about Edward Snowden and the—what you have learned from the leaks of this NSA contractor, the exposé after exposé of surveillance inside the United States and outside?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Edward Snowden opened the eyes of the world to an international crime: the NSA&#8217;s spying on the whole world. And that&#8217;s a violation of international law. And furthermore, it doesn&#8217;t just violate international law, it violates international trust, not just of one&#8217;s friends and enemies, as you say. And that, in and of itself, is grave. In the world, there are not countries that are friends and countries that are enemies. We all deserve respect and shouldn&#8217;t be categorized as such. But in the rhetoric of the U.S. government, in that even the U.S. government&#8217;s so-called friends were respected—they wanted to know absolutely everything that was going on. So, the—what Snowden denounced, this is very useful and allows us to correct what&#8217;s been going on. And the U.N. should take take that up. Unfortunately, sometimes the power relations are such that these issues are not addressed. For example, it&#8217;s not on the agenda of the U.N. General Assembly. And that&#8217;s unfortunate.
AMY GOODMAN : President Rousseff of Brazil has canceled her state visit to Washington because of the information that has come out, based on the leaks, that she was being spied on, that the [Brazilian] energy company Petrobras was being spied on. Do you think you, here at the mission, at the embassy in Washington, that Ecuador is being spied on?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Well, I couldn&#8217;t tell you. But when I was visiting Julian Assange a few weeks ago in—
AMY GOODMAN : Julian Assange in London.
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Julian Assange.
AMY GOODMAN : In your embassy.
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] In London, in the Ecuadorean embassy, they found a few days before my visit a hidden microphone in the office of our ambassador. And we still haven&#8217;t been able to ascertain who planted it. But we can imagine who might have put it there. The information that Snowden provided indicates that everybody is spied on. And so, one should probably assume that we&#8217;ve been spied on, as well.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuela has offered Edward Snowden political asylum. Is Ecuador weighing this, like you have Julian Assange?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Well, let&#8217;s see. We are a very sovereign country with very firm positions, and Julian Assange is protected by asylum that Ecuador has provided him with. When the case of Edward Snowden arose, Ecuador was the first country that offered to analyze his asylum request, while many countries immediately rejected the request. Ecuador considered that it was best not to be alone in this fight, because it&#8217;s a very difficult, sticky matter, given the political landscape of the world, and we can&#8217;t ignore that fact. That&#8217;s why we spoke with the ALBA countries, and we addressed the issue of Snowden, and we told them that we thought that it was important that other countries also offer a possible asylum to him. And because of that, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia offered asylum to him directly. And we thought that was good, because Ecuador can&#8217;t carry the weight of all these issues as if we were a very powerful country. That&#8217;s not the case. That&#8217;s why we&#8217;re pleased that these other countries have offered asylum and made that decision, so that they don&#8217;t gang up on us.
AMY GOODMAN : And Julian Assange&#8217;s fate? He remains in the Ecuadorean mission in London, in the embassy in London. It&#8217;s been more than a year.
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Yes. And, unfortunately, the United Kingdom still has not provided him with safe conduct. I have spoken a number of times with William Hague, and we&#8217;ve also provided him with the legal arguments which don&#8217;t just allow the United Kingdom, but actually compel and force the United Kingdom to provide safe conduct, but they continue to refuse to provide it. So, the decision is in the hands of the U.K.
AMY GOODMAN : President Correa was just visiting with Fidel Castro in Cuba, spent several hours with him. What is Fidel Castro&#8217;s influence on Latin America and his significance? And also, if you could end, finally, by talking about the legacy of former Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Well, Fidel Castro is an international figure. He is a man who managed to liberate his country from the Batista dictatorship and laid the foundation for a society that is beneficial for all of the Cubans. Unfortunately, the reaction of the United States government was to attack Cuba and to impose a criminal embargo. But the Cuban government, despite these problems, has managed to defend the life and well-being and health of its people. And not only, it has also offered international cooperation. Despite its economic limitations, it&#8217;s offered international cooperation with other countries. They offered it to Ecuador, in fact. I say it with a certain amount of concern. We would have loved that Europe and the United States offer the thousands of scholarships that Cuba has offered to Ecuadorean students to study medicine. There are 2,000 Ecuadorean students who are studying medicine in Cuba. Other countries only want to train our military personnel. That&#8217;s quite a contrast. So, that&#8217;s just a way to begin to respond to your question: What is the influence of Fidel Castro? I think it&#8217;s a moral influence. I participated in the conversations that President Correa has had with Fidel Castro. In fact, I was present at the last conversation. And Fidel Castro never offered advice to us. We talk about the state of the world and how to achieve better development, how to improve healthcare and protection of our natural resources. That&#8217;s what we talk about.
AMY GOODMAN : How is Fidel Castro&#8217;s health?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] He is a bit challenged in terms of mobility. But in terms of lucidity and reasoning and his concern for world issues, it&#8217;s quite extraordinary what one learns from him. He has an incredible memory and a capacity to analyze current events and to foresee what&#8217;s going to happen. He is already 30 or 50 years ahead of the curve. But his mobility is a bit problematic.
AMY GOODMAN : And the legacy of Chávez?
RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] The legacy of Hugo Chávez is extraordinary. After the Cuban revolution, it&#8217;s in 1998, when Hugo Chávez took office. And he was totally alone in Latin America. There were a lot of right-wing and neoliberal governments, and he would take a really strong stance in international events. And it was really hard, because he was isolated. Imagine how difficult it is to be the lone voice and have everybody against you. But, little by little, other progressive governments came to power, and now there&#8217;s many progressive governments—Brazil, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia, Nicaragua—many other progressive governments in the Caribbean, as well, that have changed the face of Latin America. But the strength and power of the discourse and the proposals of Hugo Chávez to create the integration of Latin America is legendary. Also, he contributed to strengthening a Latin American and Caribbean consciousness about the need for greater unity. And so, that&#8217;s why we always speak of Hugo Chávez with a lot of respect and endearment, because he stood with Ecuador when times were tough, like he did with other countries. He supported our process and contributed to the dream of Simón Bolívar and contributed to making that dream a reality.
AMY GOODMAN : Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Ricardo Patiño. I interviewed him on Monday at the permanent mission of Ecuador to the United Nations. President Correa has decided not to address the U.N. General Assembly this year. You can visit our website at democracynow.org to watch more of our interview , as the foreign minister talks about the crisis in Syria, Ecuador&#8217;s controversial new media law and Patiño&#8217;s time working with the Sandinistas in Nicaragua.
This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . When we come back, we head north to talk about the Keystone XL, not here in the United States, but in Canada. Stay with us.

AMYGOODMAN: Why is President Correa not addressing the U.N. General Assembly like so many world leaders are?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] President Correa doesn’t have a lot of expectations about what is said in the meetings of the General Assembly. He attended one General Assembly and addressed the hall, but there were no world leaders in the room at the time to hear what he had to say. It seems like only the first speeches are given importance, and the rest... So, there’s concern about the methodology of how things are organized here. And since he had the experience that he had here in the U.N., he was, quite frankly, just frustrated, and he’s not really interested in participating in an event where nobody really seems to be interested in hearing each other.

AMYGOODMAN: Foreign Minister, what about Edward Snowden and the—what you have learned from the leaks of this NSA contractor, the exposé after exposé of surveillance inside the United States and outside?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Edward Snowden opened the eyes of the world to an international crime: the NSA’s spying on the whole world. And that’s a violation of international law. And furthermore, it doesn’t just violate international law, it violates international trust, not just of one’s friends and enemies, as you say. And that, in and of itself, is grave. In the world, there are not countries that are friends and countries that are enemies. We all deserve respect and shouldn’t be categorized as such. But in the rhetoric of the U.S. government, in that even the U.S. government’s so-called friends were respected—they wanted to know absolutely everything that was going on. So, the—what Snowden denounced, this is very useful and allows us to correct what’s been going on. And the U.N. should take take that up. Unfortunately, sometimes the power relations are such that these issues are not addressed. For example, it’s not on the agenda of the U.N. General Assembly. And that’s unfortunate.

AMYGOODMAN: President Rousseff of Brazil has canceled her state visit to Washington because of the information that has come out, based on the leaks, that she was being spied on, that the [Brazilian] energy company Petrobras was being spied on. Do you think you, here at the mission, at the embassy in Washington, that Ecuador is being spied on?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Well, I couldn’t tell you. But when I was visiting Julian Assange a few weeks ago in—

AMYGOODMAN: Julian Assange in London.

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Julian Assange.

AMYGOODMAN: In your embassy.

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] In London, in the Ecuadorean embassy, they found a few days before my visit a hidden microphone in the office of our ambassador. And we still haven’t been able to ascertain who planted it. But we can imagine who might have put it there. The information that Snowden provided indicates that everybody is spied on. And so, one should probably assume that we’ve been spied on, as well.

AMYGOODMAN: Venezuela has offered Edward Snowden political asylum. Is Ecuador weighing this, like you have Julian Assange?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Well, let’s see. We are a very sovereign country with very firm positions, and Julian Assange is protected by asylum that Ecuador has provided him with. When the case of Edward Snowden arose, Ecuador was the first country that offered to analyze his asylum request, while many countries immediately rejected the request. Ecuador considered that it was best not to be alone in this fight, because it’s a very difficult, sticky matter, given the political landscape of the world, and we can’t ignore that fact. That’s why we spoke with the ALBA countries, and we addressed the issue of Snowden, and we told them that we thought that it was important that other countries also offer a possible asylum to him. And because of that, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia offered asylum to him directly. And we thought that was good, because Ecuador can’t carry the weight of all these issues as if we were a very powerful country. That’s not the case. That’s why we’re pleased that these other countries have offered asylum and made that decision, so that they don’t gang up on us.

AMYGOODMAN: And Julian Assange’s fate? He remains in the Ecuadorean mission in London, in the embassy in London. It’s been more than a year.

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Yes. And, unfortunately, the United Kingdom still has not provided him with safe conduct. I have spoken a number of times with William Hague, and we’ve also provided him with the legal arguments which don’t just allow the United Kingdom, but actually compel and force the United Kingdom to provide safe conduct, but they continue to refuse to provide it. So, the decision is in the hands of the U.K.

AMYGOODMAN: President Correa was just visiting with Fidel Castro in Cuba, spent several hours with him. What is Fidel Castro’s influence on Latin America and his significance? And also, if you could end, finally, by talking about the legacy of former Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] Well, Fidel Castro is an international figure. He is a man who managed to liberate his country from the Batista dictatorship and laid the foundation for a society that is beneficial for all of the Cubans. Unfortunately, the reaction of the United States government was to attack Cuba and to impose a criminal embargo. But the Cuban government, despite these problems, has managed to defend the life and well-being and health of its people. And not only, it has also offered international cooperation. Despite its economic limitations, it’s offered international cooperation with other countries. They offered it to Ecuador, in fact. I say it with a certain amount of concern. We would have loved that Europe and the United States offer the thousands of scholarships that Cuba has offered to Ecuadorean students to study medicine. There are 2,000 Ecuadorean students who are studying medicine in Cuba. Other countries only want to train our military personnel. That’s quite a contrast. So, that’s just a way to begin to respond to your question: What is the influence of Fidel Castro? I think it’s a moral influence. I participated in the conversations that President Correa has had with Fidel Castro. In fact, I was present at the last conversation. And Fidel Castro never offered advice to us. We talk about the state of the world and how to achieve better development, how to improve healthcare and protection of our natural resources. That’s what we talk about.

AMYGOODMAN: How is Fidel Castro’s health?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] He is a bit challenged in terms of mobility. But in terms of lucidity and reasoning and his concern for world issues, it’s quite extraordinary what one learns from him. He has an incredible memory and a capacity to analyze current events and to foresee what’s going to happen. He is already 30 or 50 years ahead of the curve. But his mobility is a bit problematic.

AMYGOODMAN: And the legacy of Chávez?

RICARDO PATIÑO: [translated] The legacy of Hugo Chávez is extraordinary. After the Cuban revolution, it’s in 1998, when Hugo Chávez took office. And he was totally alone in Latin America. There were a lot of right-wing and neoliberal governments, and he would take a really strong stance in international events. And it was really hard, because he was isolated. Imagine how difficult it is to be the lone voice and have everybody against you. But, little by little, other progressive governments came to power, and now there’s many progressive governments—Brazil, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia, Nicaragua—many other progressive governments in the Caribbean, as well, that have changed the face of Latin America. But the strength and power of the discourse and the proposals of Hugo Chávez to create the integration of Latin America is legendary. Also, he contributed to strengthening a Latin American and Caribbean consciousness about the need for greater unity. And so, that’s why we always speak of Hugo Chávez with a lot of respect and endearment, because he stood with Ecuador when times were tough, like he did with other countries. He supported our process and contributed to the dream of Simón Bolívar and contributed to making that dream a reality.

AMYGOODMAN: Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Ricardo Patiño. I interviewed him on Monday at the permanent mission of Ecuador to the United Nations. President Correa has decided not to address the U.N. General Assembly this year. You can visit our website at democracynow.org to watch more of our interview, as the foreign minister talks about the crisis in Syria, Ecuador’s controversial new media law and Patiño’s time working with the Sandinistas in Nicaragua.

This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. When we come back, we head north to talk about the Keystone XL, not here in the United States, but in Canada. Stay with us.

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Tue, 24 Sep 2013 00:00:00 -0400Will Chávez Revolution Continue in Venezuela? A Debate After Maduro's Close Election Victoryhttp://www.democracynow.org/2013/4/15/will_chvez_revolution_continue_in_venezuela
tag:democracynow.org,2013-04-15:en/story/86a699 AMY GOODMAN : We begin in Venezuela, where Nicolás Maduro has narrowly won Sunday&#8217;s election to choose a replacement for Chávez, who died of cancer last month. Maduro had served as vice president and foreign minister under President Hugo Chávez. The National Electoral Council said Maduro received 50.7 percent of the vote, Henrique Capriles Radonski won 49.1 percent. The vote was far closer than one in October when Chávez beat Capriles by 11 percentage points.
In his victory speech, Maduro, a former bus driver, said a new era for the Bolivarian revolution is beginning.
PRESIDENT - ELECT NICOLÁS MADURO : [translated] Long live Chávez! Long live Chávez! Long live Chávez! Until victory forever, let&#8217;s go to the streets to defend this victory, to defend the triumph, in peace and in order to celebrate with the people and to remember that we have complied with the commander. Chávez, I swear to you, we have fulfilled your promise for independence and a socialist fatherland.
AMY GOODMAN : Sunday&#8217;s vote was the closest presidential election in Venezuela since 1968. Capriles, the governor of the state of Miranda, is refusing to concede defeat and has demanded a recount.
HENRIQUE CAPRILES RADONSKI : [translated] I want to say to the government&#8217;s candidate, the loser today is you. And I say that firmly. You are the loser, you and your government. I say that with firmness and with all the compromise and transparency. We will not recognize the results until each and every Venezuelan vote, one by one, has been counted. We demand here that the National Electoral Council open all of the boxes and that each Venezuelan vote be counted.
AMY GOODMAN : On Sunday, Venezuelan voters talked about the significance of the election to pick a successor to the late Hugo Chávez.
DANIEL TORRES : [translated] Without a doubt, this is an act that will leave a relevant mark in our history. But it is forming the start of another era, an era 14 years before, and we&#8217;ll have to wait and see what will happen in the 14 years after.
RONNIE GONZALEZ : [translated] I am here early in hopes of improving the situation. I am anxious to execute my right and try to implement the change to the situation that has been agitating all Venezuelans.
MARIA RODRIGUEZ : [translated] Now, with Maduro, we also have to carry out the tasks he gives us, and, God willing, we hope this president will carry on with what the past president left behind.
AMY GOODMAN : To talk about the election and the state of Venezuela after the death of Chávez, we&#8217;re joined by two guests.
Rory Carroll is author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez&#8217;s Venezuela . He was The Guardian &#39;s Latin America correspondent and was based in Caracas until last year. He&#39;s now the U.S. West Coast correspondent for The Guardian , based in Los Angeles.
Mark Weisbrot joins us from Washington, D.C., an economist and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
Mark, let&#8217;s begin with you. Can you talk about the significance of what took place yesterday, the election of Nicolás Maduro?
MARK WEISBROT : Well, I think it is—you know, the majority, at least, did vote for continuity, and I think they did so mainly because there was a large increase in living standards for people over the past 14 years, you know? If you take the point where the government got control over the oil industry, since then—because they couldn&#8217;t really do anything before that—since then, the poverty was reduced by 50 percent, extreme poverty by 70 percent. You had millions of people got access to free healthcare for the first time. Unemployment was 14-and-a-half percent when Chávez took office; it was 8 percent last year. So, big increases in employment and living standards. And I think, you know, that&#8217;s why they voted for.
I think also it was very lucky for the country that the Chávez government established this really secure electoral system. Now, you can see Capriles is—he&#8217;s kind of playing to the part of the opposition that in every election has not wanted to accept the results. Every election since 2004, there&#8217;s been a part of the opposition that just says, you know, &quot;We don&#8217;t buy it.&quot; But he&#8217;s not really going to do anything, I don&#8217;t think, because it&#8217;s very easy to have an audit. The system they have, Jimmy Carter called it the best in the world, and it really is quite good. I mean, they have two records of every vote. You push a touch screen: You have an electronic record. And then you have a receipt that goes in the ballot box. And all you have to do is compare those. And they will do that. And I&#8217;m sure it won&#8217;t change the result, because the margin is still large enough. It&#8217;s around 275,000 votes. So, it&#8217;s good—it&#8217;s very good for the country that they have a system like that and will be able to resolve it.
I think the election also has enormous significance for the region. That&#8217;s why you already saw the congratulations coming in, you know, from Argentina, from Ecuador. And all of the governments, I think, will, you know, stand behind if there&#8217;s any conflict over it. They&#8217;ll stand behind the government of Venezuela.
And, of course, on the other side is the United States, and I think that&#8217;s something that your viewers and listeners should really understand, is that whenever we talk about Venezuela here in the United States, you know, there&#8217;s really only two reasons you have as much news—and all of it&#8217;s bad—about Venezuela. One is that Venezuela is the primary target for regime change from the United States government, has been since the coup that the U.S. was involved in in 2002, you know, the primary target in the world probably, with the possible exception of Iran. And secondly, it has the largest oil reserves in the world. And those two things of course are related.
And that&#8217;s going to continue to shape relations with the United States. The United States is not really going to change its policy in the foreseeable future. They&#8217;ll still be trying to get rid of this government and really any target of opportunity they have among the left governments in South America. You know, you can see what happened in Paraguay last year, for example. There&#8217;s a nice article in The Nation by Natalia Viana showing that the USAID supported the coup there. And you had Honduras. You know, President Zelaya was on your show saying that the U.S. was involved in that coup in 2009. So, there&#8217;s always going to—the U.S. stepped up funding after the coup in 2002 to Venezuela, and I think they&#8217;ll continue to be active there.
AMY GOODMAN : Rory Carroll, you wrote Comandante: Hugo Chávez&#8217;s Venezuela . Your assessment of the significance of the election in Venezuela, and your response to economist Mark Weisbrot?
RORY CARROLL : Hi. Good morning, Amy. Good morning, Mark.
I think the significance of the result was written on the faces of the people, of the ministers behind Nicolás Maduro on the balcony last night. I mean, they were extremely somber, and they were shaken. I mean, this is not a good result for Nicolás Maduro or Chavismo, although they have won, and very, very narrowly. And it&#8217;s shockingly narrow. And the opinion polls and they themselves have been suggesting a sweeping double-digit victory. And the fact that they&#8217;ve just squeaked in is a major blow to his authority, his authority in terms of just the country nationally. It shows just how polarized the country is: It&#8217;s a 50-50 nation now. And also, it will undermine his own authority within the ranks of Chavismo. And I think many people within the movement will wonder now whether Nicolás Maduro really is the best man to lead them, because they have been so accustomed to these huge landslides that Hugo Chávez used to win, time after time.
And I think the reason this time that the landslide didn&#8217;t happen is really quite revealing, in some ways, because this is a government that had huge advantages of incumbency. And firstly, it controls the—pretty much most of the money in the country. As a petro state at a time of high oil prices, it has had huge powers of patronage, which it used lavishly to bolster its position, and happily blending party and state&#8217;s resources to cement that advantage. Also, you had civil servants whom, as ever, were instructed that you will vote for the government, or perhaps you won&#8217;t have a job. You had the head of the armed forces telling people, either hinting or also saying so explicitly, that you will vote for the government. And so, these are very strong advantages for the government.
And the fact that, with all of that, they still so narrowly won—basically lost 49-point-something percent of the population, shows that a lot of Venezuelans are unhappy. And they&#8217;re unhappy with insecurity, the fact that murder rates are out of control in Venezuela, especially in Caracas. They&#8217;re not happy with the fact that the economy is really quite dysfunctional and the fact that there are shortages of many basic goods and the fact that currency controls means that it&#8217;s very difficult for any businesses to do anything. And the fact that inflation is so strong means that daily life is often quite, quite difficult for people. And Venezuelans are no different to anybody else, in the sense that they just want—they want good jobs, and they want to be safe. And I think the vote that we saw was a sign that many people are not happy there.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to break and come back to this discussion with Rory Carroll, author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez&#8217;s Venezuela , also a reporter for The Guardian , and Mark Weisbrot, who&#8217;s speaking to us from D.C.—Center for Economic and Policy Research is his organization—an economist. This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . Back in a minute.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : You&#8217;re listening to Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . I&#8217;m Amy Goodman, as we talk about the results of the election in Venezuela: winning by a very slim margin, Nicolás Maduro, over Henrique Capriles. We urge folks to go to the website, democracynow.org. Our guests are Rory Carroll, author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez&#8217;s Venezuela and the—of The Guardian , and Mark Weisbrot, Center for Economic and Policy Research.
Mark, your response to the critique of Rory Carroll to what&#8217;s happened in Venezuela today?
MARK WEISBROT : Well, first, we don&#8217;t want to exaggerate the advantage—or, I&#8217;m not even sure the government really had an advantage. You know, their state television has about a 6 percent audience share, so that&#8217;s not that much. And, you know, they even showed commercials for Capriles, for the opposition candidate, on state TV. And so—and then, of course, the print media is very much against the government, and the radio is probably against the government, as well. And so—and, of course, most of the wealth and income of the country is in the hands of the opposition, and they had plenty of ads. They were very sophisticated, very—a lot of resources. They ran a very good campaign. They did the same thing in the last election. So, I think this is a fairly level playing field compared especially to other—the average election in Latin America. I mean, look at Mexico, for example, where you had the media really determine the outcome of the election in 2006, and probably 2012, as well. where the left-of-center candidate doesn&#8217;t even have a chance, you know, with that kind of media duopoly as 95 percent of the media. So, this is a competitive election.
And I do think that there are serious problems the government has to deal with, and this is—this should be a wake-up call for them. I mean, you know, what happened since the last election that I think might have moved some of the 3 or 4 percent that moved from Chávez to the other camp was the economy deteriorated some—you know, the shortages that Rory was talking about. This is a problem mostly in the exchange rate system that has been badly managed. So, I think they need to stabilize the exchange rate. They need to make sure that foreign exchange is available, like it was. You know, you had a recovery. I mean, the economy has been growing for almost three years now. And so, it began to grow in—after the world recession and the recession they had in the middle of 2010. And it grew, and growth accelerated, and inflation was actually falling, right up to the last—almost to the last election, while the economy accelerated. And so, you didn&#8217;t have other problems that you&#8217;ve had in the last five months with the shortages, and so—and the increasing inflation you&#8217;ve had in the last few months. So I think that, definitely, the government needs to stabilize the exchange rate. They need to bring inflation down. And those two things together will get rid of the shortages, as they have in the past. They&#8217;ve reduced them and gotten rid of them at some points. And I think that&#8217;s some of the things they&#8217;re going to have to do. And they have to keep the economy growing and employment growing.
I think they—you know, if the other side would have won, you would have had a classic austerity plan immediately, and they would have brought down inflation by having a recession. I hope that this government doesn&#8217;t do that. They would have brought down imports, as well, the same way. I think this government can in fact resolve the problems of the exchange rate system and inflation while allowing the economy to grow, as they were doing right up to the last quarter of last year.
AMY GOODMAN : Rory Carroll, I wanted to get your response to Mark, as well as this comment. Following Chávez&#8217;s death last month, we spoke to Carol Delgado , the Venezuelan consul general in New York. She had returned to Caracas for the state funeral and praised Chávez&#8217;s work for the poor.
CAROL DELGADO : Venezuela has reduced poverty dramatically, particularly extreme poverty. Venezuelans right now have education, free up to the university level. We have free, universal health for everyone. And those kind of achievements are fantastic.
AMY GOODMAN : Rory Carroll, your response?
RORY CARROLL : Certainly there have been impressive social gains made in the past 10 years, but unfortunately there&#8217;s a problem of sustainability, and a lot of those social gains appear to be fraying. Those deep falls in poverty appear to have more or less halted, or certainly slowed very much, since 2010, and in social programs. If you visit public hospitals in Venezuela, as I&#8217;ve done many times, it&#8217;s pretty Dickensian, in terms of—there&#8217;s broken glass. Often there are power shortages in the hospitals. People have to bring their own medicines. They have to bring their own bedsheets. Criminals can break into hospitals and threaten staff. And these are—these are the main public hospitals in Caracas that we&#8217;re talking about. If you go outside the capital, it can be even more grim. So, I think there has to be a bit of a health warning, if you like, over some of the acclaim for some of these social programs, unfortunately.
That said, yes, poverty has fallen, and people have more money in their pockets, so they—and that&#8217;s great. But the country is increasingly lost in a labyrinth of petro populism. You need just to look at the statistics about the dependence on oil exports. I mean, now they&#8217;re about 94 percent dependent on—for their foreign revenue, revenue on oil exports. And the reason for that—or the consequence of that is that there really—there are hidden degrees of unemployment, because factories are—especially state-owned factories are either working at half capacity—I went to Ciudad Guayana, the industrial heartland of Venezuela, and there&#8217;s a whole chapter in the book about that, which shows that this great kind of manufacturing potential that Venezuela has has really been squandered.
AMY GOODMAN : Rory, I wanted—I wanted to ask you something. In your own newspaper, The Guardian , it said infant mortality is now lower than in 1999, from a rate of 20 per thousand live births to 13 in 2011; that poverty has decreased, in 1999 23.4 percent of the population recorded as being in extreme poverty, fell to 8.5 percent in 2011, according to official government figures. Can you talk about your trajectory of changing your view of Hugo Chávez when you first went down as a reporter and what made you shift to your critique of him?
RORY CARROLL : Yeah, I did—I was there for six years, from 2006 &#39;til last year, full time, although I still regularly visit. And I think, for me, the leitmotif is waste, wasted opportunity, that with Hugo Chávez, it was an immensely gifted politician, and he had such a strong mandate, he had—he had the great fortune to coincide with this explosion in oil revenues, and there was such goodwill behind him, and yet—and he was such a brilliant campaigner, but unfortunately, as a governor, as a ruler, he was—he was incompetent. And he more or less admitted this towards the end. I mean, he was asked one time, &quot;Do have any regrets?&quot; And he thought about it, and he said, &quot;Well, mi gestión ,&quot; you know, most like &quot;My management.&quot; And we could—we see that in this kind of profound dysfunction. And just one example will be the infrastructure, the fact that they neglected to invest in infrastructure or maintain it, as the result of which now there are power cuts all the time, especially outside the city, outside Caracas. And yet the government, under Hugo Chávez and also now Nicolás Maduro, they resort to these kind of surreal excuses, like they blame mercenaries or maybe the CIA for sabotage, rather than the fact—the more banal fact is that this reflects a decade of mismanagement. And that applies really to the wider economy. And I just think it&#39;s a wasted opportunity, because you just look further south to Brazil, and you can see there how they&#8217;ve made increasing—just as impressive reductions in poverty that are clearly much more sustainable.
AMY GOODMAN : I wanted to turn to, well, at the time Foreign Minister Maduro in our studio. Juan González and I interviewed the new elected president, Nicolás Maduro, in October of 2007. This was during the Bush years, when he served as Chávez&#8217;s foreign minister. It was a year after Chávez had famously referred to then-President George W. Bush as the devil in a speech before the United Nations, saying, quote, &quot;The devil came here yesterday. It smells like sulfur today.&quot; I asked Maduro what message he had for the United States.
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what&#8217;s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.
Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it&#8217;s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That&#8217;s the main message, and that&#8217;s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.
AMY GOODMAN : That was Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro, who was just elected president yesterday in Venezuela. Mark Weisbrot, if you could tell us exactly who Nicolás Maduro is, where he comes from, and the significance of this election, and if you think, in the call for the recount, is it possible that they would come up with different figures, since this was such a razor-slim margin that he won by yesterday?
MARK WEISBROT : Yes, well, it wasn&#8217;t that slim. I mean, it was 1.6 percentage points and around 300,000 votes, so it&#8217;s not going to be changed. And, I mean, it&#8217;s—anything is possible. There could have been some mistake, but it&#8217;s just really, really, really unlikely. And given the secure system they, I—and Maduro has said, by the way, you know, Capriles asked for 100 percent of the ballots instead of the—normally do like 54 percent, which is way more than you need. And he said, basically, yes. So, I don&#8217;t think there&#8217;s going to be any doubt.
In terms of Maduro, you know, he was the foreign minister for six years. He did a pretty good job, really. I think most people would recognize that. He comes from a left background. He was a union organizer and a bus driver. And I think he&#8217;s going to continue, you know, a lot of the same policies.
I want to just respond to Rory, if I can, because I think he presented what you see in the media every day. Now, he didn&#8217;t challenge the statistics that you gave on poverty and extreme poverty, and nobody does, but these are—you know, and those are huge changes in people&#8217;s lives, you know? And, of course, all the other changes that we talked about—employment. I didn&#8217;t even mention income, real income growth. But instead, the media focuses on everything that&#8217;s bad. I mean, you could do that with the Clinton years. You know, Clinton presided over the largest economic—longest economic expansion in U.S. history, and there were still a lot of bad things, you know, going on in the United States, even though unemployment hit record lows and, you know, poverty reduced sharply—and it came back, by the way, after he was gone. But, you know, this is just presenting this completely one-sided picture that you see every single day. Yeah, the public hospitals deteriorated, but that&#8217;s one of the reasons why they created—because they couldn&#8217;t control the health ministry, so that&#8217;s why they created the misiones to provide healthcare for millions of people there. And so, yeah, you know, there&#8217;s no doubt that Rory&#8217;s talking about problems—there were serious problems in administration. But to say that—you know, to just say that this was a failure? I mean, if you look at Venezuela the 20 years prior to Chávez, where the economy actually shrank in a per capita basis, I mean, this is a huge improvement in people&#8217;s living standards. And that&#8217;s why they&#8217;ve won 15 out of the last 16 elections. It&#8217;s not, as the media would have it, just because Chávez was a great performer and had a lot of charisma. I think that&#8217;s very important for people to understand.
AMY GOODMAN : Rory Carroll, on the issue of those statistics, the figures that I just read, according to your own paper and to the government figures, the serious reduction in extreme poverty, your response to that?
RORY CARROLL : Yes. Well, I think—I mean, those are the function of two things. One is the oil prices increased from about $8 or $9 a barrel when Hugo Chávez took over; in 1999, they exploded up to more than $100 a barrel. And this put huge amounts of money into the Venezuelan treasury. And we saw in the 1970s, during a previous boom, that there are falls in poverty and that this generates lots of money in the economy. And Venezuela, above all, is a petro state. And that, in a sense, the—this fall of poverty, in many ways, reflected that. But it did also reflect the lavish spending that Hugo Chávez&#8217;s government did with this boom. They spent very generously on social programs, and rightly so. They invested a lot on reducing poverty, and that&#8217;s all great.
The problem, the catch—and it&#8217;s a big one—is that the way they did it was clearly not sustainable. And many of—instead of building an economy that—with real jobs, which would give the poor people like a permanent leg up, I think we see a lot of the money has been spent on subsidies, the fact that gasoline is basically free—which is, in a way, a regressive subsidy: It benefits the middle class more than the poor. The fact that so many prices are kind of frozen and that they have to send out the police and the army to try to enforce these price controls is just one indication of just how things are distorted there. And as Mark himself said, I mean, for example, they couldn&#8217;t control the health ministry. Well, why not? I mean, they were the health ministry. And that&#8217;s reflective of the wider dysfunction in the government. And therein lies the tragedy.
AMY GOODMAN : Mark Weisbrot—
MARK WEISBROT : Can I respond to that? Yeah. First of all—
AMY GOODMAN : If you would respond, and also if you could talk about what has been the U.S. role in Venezuela.
MARK WEISBROT : Yeah, that&#8217;s very important, too. I mean, that&#8217;s—well, but first let&#8217;s talk about sustainability. For 14 years, all of the media, and especially the business press, you know, 90 percent of the media, has been predicting economic collapse in Venezuela. They&#8217;ve always said it&#8217;s unsustainable. You know, I have these debates with opposition economists, and they don&#8217;t dispute any of the statistics; all they say is next year it&#8217;s going to collapse. Well, they&#8217;ve been saying this for 14 years, and it hasn&#8217;t collapsed yet. They&#8217;ve had two recessions. One was caused by an opposition oil strike in 2002 and 2003—certainly not the government&#8217;s fault—and the other that was caused at the—in 2009 and half of 2010 that was brought on by the world recession. So, it&#8217;s not going to collapse. This idea of sustainability, that&#8217;s just saying, you know, &quot;We hope it collapses, and it&#8217;s going to collapse some day, and we hope it&#8217;s soon.&quot; And it&#8217;s not going to. And, you know, they don&#8217;t have an unsustainable debt. So, unsustainable is like what we had in 2006, when you had an $8 trillion housing bubble, and everybody who was looking at it, which unfortunately wasn&#8217;t most economists, could tell you that it was going to burst and it was going to cause a huge recession, OK? They don&#8217;t have those kinds of imbalances. They have a problem: You know, they have inflation, and inflation is higher than their trading partners, and so that appreciates their real exchange rate, and that&#8217;s why you had a devaluation. And this is an ongoing problem that they have to fix. But that isn&#8217;t like what we had, where you have a giant bubble, asset bubble, collapses, and you get a great recession out of it. So, this is all—a lot of this is really exaggerated.
Now, the other question about the U.S. role, that&#8217;s very important, because, you know, Rory points to Brazil and says, &quot;Well, they were able to do a lot of nice things, and they didn&#8217;t have this polarization and conflict and all these things that we don&#8217;t like.&quot; Well, that&#8217;s great, but they weren&#8217;t facing the same kind of opposition that had, you know, according to Petkoff—Teodoro Petkoff, a leader of the opposition himself, said they had a strategy of military overthrow from 1999 to 2003, OK? Brazil didn&#8217;t have that. They had the military—was as nationalistic as the government. And they had—they didn&#8217;t have the United States, on the side of this—not only the military, but the opposition—telling them all along and pouring money in there and saying, &quot;You just—you know, we get rid of everybody we don&#8217;t like in this region, and you just hang in there, and you don&#8217;t have to deal with this guy. You don&#8217;t have to be part of a government. You can boycott the 2005 elections,&quot; as they did for the National Assembly. &quot;You can pretend that the 2004 referendum was stolen,&quot; even though Jimmy Carter—the Carter Center certified it, and so did the OAS . This is what Chávez had to deal with.
So, yeah, he was a polarizing figure, if you want to say that, but he was dealing with people who, every time he offered them an olive branch, they just slapped him in the face. And they had no intention of ever dealing with him. And, you know, in that sense, you can say there&#8217;s progress, because here, at least, you know, they&#8217;re participating in elections. They started doing that in 2006. And they have started accepting the results. So there&#8217;s some progress there. But again, you know, this is the U.S. main—as I said, it&#8217;s the number one or two target for regime change. The opposition knows that. And they don&#8217;t feel like there&#8217;s any reason to work with the government the way the opposition in Brazil does.
AMY GOODMAN : Rory Carroll, your quick response, as we wrap up?
RORY CARROLL : Well, I think there&#8217;s so much bluster, really, in terms of the U.S.-Venezuelan relationship. Venezuela continues, and has always, under Chávez, and will continue to do so, sells oil to the United States. Companies like Chevron operate in Venezuela. And the United States will continue to buy Venezuela&#8217;s oil. And I think the U.S.&#39;s shameful role in the 2002 coup has been well documented, but that was, you know, more than a decade ago. And I think this heightened rhetorical attacks between—from Caracas really have been—served largely now as a distraction, and the fact that we saw it reaching kind of surreal levels with Nicolás Maduro basically accusing the CIA or the United States of poisoning Hugo Chávez, of giving him cancer, and really—and that&#39;s ridiculous.
AMY GOODMAN : Mark Weisbrot, on that one issue of the charges and the belief of many in Venezuela that the United States killed Hugo Chávez?
MARK WEISBROT : Well, they haven&#8217;t presented any evidence, so until they do I can&#8217;t say that it has any validity. But I can understand why people would believe it. How many times did they try to kill Castro? And how many times have they, you know, done things like this? They have a—White House has a kill list where they kill people they don&#8217;t like every week. So, yeah, I mean, I can see why the people would believe that, but I have no idea whether there&#8217;s any validity to it.
AMY GOODMAN : Well, we&#8217;re going to leave it there, but we&#8217;re going to, of course, continue to follow politics in Venezuela. I want to thank Mark Weisbrot from the Center for Economic and Policy Research and Rory Carroll, author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez&#8217;s Venezuela . He also writes for The Guardian newspaper.
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, well, it&#8217;s Tax Day, and we&#8217;ll speak with a tax resister. Stay with us. AMYGOODMAN: We begin in Venezuela, where Nicolás Maduro has narrowly won Sunday’s election to choose a replacement for Chávez, who died of cancer last month. Maduro had served as vice president and foreign minister under President Hugo Chávez. The National Electoral Council said Maduro received 50.7 percent of the vote, Henrique Capriles Radonski won 49.1 percent. The vote was far closer than one in October when Chávez beat Capriles by 11 percentage points.

In his victory speech, Maduro, a former bus driver, said a new era for the Bolivarian revolution is beginning.

PRESIDENT-ELECT NICOLÁS MADURO: [translated] Long live Chávez! Long live Chávez! Long live Chávez! Until victory forever, let’s go to the streets to defend this victory, to defend the triumph, in peace and in order to celebrate with the people and to remember that we have complied with the commander. Chávez, I swear to you, we have fulfilled your promise for independence and a socialist fatherland.

AMYGOODMAN: Sunday’s vote was the closest presidential election in Venezuela since 1968. Capriles, the governor of the state of Miranda, is refusing to concede defeat and has demanded a recount.

HENRIQUECAPRILESRADONSKI: [translated] I want to say to the government’s candidate, the loser today is you. And I say that firmly. You are the loser, you and your government. I say that with firmness and with all the compromise and transparency. We will not recognize the results until each and every Venezuelan vote, one by one, has been counted. We demand here that the National Electoral Council open all of the boxes and that each Venezuelan vote be counted.

AMYGOODMAN: On Sunday, Venezuelan voters talked about the significance of the election to pick a successor to the late Hugo Chávez.

DANIELTORRES: [translated] Without a doubt, this is an act that will leave a relevant mark in our history. But it is forming the start of another era, an era 14 years before, and we’ll have to wait and see what will happen in the 14 years after.

RONNIEGONZALEZ: [translated] I am here early in hopes of improving the situation. I am anxious to execute my right and try to implement the change to the situation that has been agitating all Venezuelans.

MARIARODRIGUEZ: [translated] Now, with Maduro, we also have to carry out the tasks he gives us, and, God willing, we hope this president will carry on with what the past president left behind.

AMYGOODMAN: To talk about the election and the state of Venezuela after the death of Chávez, we’re joined by two guests.

Rory Carroll is author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela. He was The Guardian's Latin America correspondent and was based in Caracas until last year. He's now the U.S. West Coast correspondent for The Guardian, based in Los Angeles.

Mark Weisbrot joins us from Washington, D.C., an economist and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Mark, let’s begin with you. Can you talk about the significance of what took place yesterday, the election of Nicolás Maduro?

MARKWEISBROT: Well, I think it is—you know, the majority, at least, did vote for continuity, and I think they did so mainly because there was a large increase in living standards for people over the past 14 years, you know? If you take the point where the government got control over the oil industry, since then—because they couldn’t really do anything before that—since then, the poverty was reduced by 50 percent, extreme poverty by 70 percent. You had millions of people got access to free healthcare for the first time. Unemployment was 14-and-a-half percent when Chávez took office; it was 8 percent last year. So, big increases in employment and living standards. And I think, you know, that’s why they voted for.

I think also it was very lucky for the country that the Chávez government established this really secure electoral system. Now, you can see Capriles is—he’s kind of playing to the part of the opposition that in every election has not wanted to accept the results. Every election since 2004, there’s been a part of the opposition that just says, you know, "We don’t buy it." But he’s not really going to do anything, I don’t think, because it’s very easy to have an audit. The system they have, Jimmy Carter called it the best in the world, and it really is quite good. I mean, they have two records of every vote. You push a touch screen: You have an electronic record. And then you have a receipt that goes in the ballot box. And all you have to do is compare those. And they will do that. And I’m sure it won’t change the result, because the margin is still large enough. It’s around 275,000 votes. So, it’s good—it’s very good for the country that they have a system like that and will be able to resolve it.

I think the election also has enormous significance for the region. That’s why you already saw the congratulations coming in, you know, from Argentina, from Ecuador. And all of the governments, I think, will, you know, stand behind if there’s any conflict over it. They’ll stand behind the government of Venezuela.

And, of course, on the other side is the United States, and I think that’s something that your viewers and listeners should really understand, is that whenever we talk about Venezuela here in the United States, you know, there’s really only two reasons you have as much news—and all of it’s bad—about Venezuela. One is that Venezuela is the primary target for regime change from the United States government, has been since the coup that the U.S. was involved in in 2002, you know, the primary target in the world probably, with the possible exception of Iran. And secondly, it has the largest oil reserves in the world. And those two things of course are related.

And that’s going to continue to shape relations with the United States. The United States is not really going to change its policy in the foreseeable future. They’ll still be trying to get rid of this government and really any target of opportunity they have among the left governments in South America. You know, you can see what happened in Paraguay last year, for example. There’s a nice article in The Nation by Natalia Viana showing that the USAID supported the coup there. And you had Honduras. You know, President Zelaya was on your show saying that the U.S. was involved in that coup in 2009. So, there’s always going to—the U.S. stepped up funding after the coup in 2002 to Venezuela, and I think they’ll continue to be active there.

AMYGOODMAN: Rory Carroll, you wrote Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela. Your assessment of the significance of the election in Venezuela, and your response to economist Mark Weisbrot?

RORYCARROLL: Hi. Good morning, Amy. Good morning, Mark.

I think the significance of the result was written on the faces of the people, of the ministers behind Nicolás Maduro on the balcony last night. I mean, they were extremely somber, and they were shaken. I mean, this is not a good result for Nicolás Maduro or Chavismo, although they have won, and very, very narrowly. And it’s shockingly narrow. And the opinion polls and they themselves have been suggesting a sweeping double-digit victory. And the fact that they’ve just squeaked in is a major blow to his authority, his authority in terms of just the country nationally. It shows just how polarized the country is: It’s a 50-50 nation now. And also, it will undermine his own authority within the ranks of Chavismo. And I think many people within the movement will wonder now whether Nicolás Maduro really is the best man to lead them, because they have been so accustomed to these huge landslides that Hugo Chávez used to win, time after time.

And I think the reason this time that the landslide didn’t happen is really quite revealing, in some ways, because this is a government that had huge advantages of incumbency. And firstly, it controls the—pretty much most of the money in the country. As a petro state at a time of high oil prices, it has had huge powers of patronage, which it used lavishly to bolster its position, and happily blending party and state’s resources to cement that advantage. Also, you had civil servants whom, as ever, were instructed that you will vote for the government, or perhaps you won’t have a job. You had the head of the armed forces telling people, either hinting or also saying so explicitly, that you will vote for the government. And so, these are very strong advantages for the government.

And the fact that, with all of that, they still so narrowly won—basically lost 49-point-something percent of the population, shows that a lot of Venezuelans are unhappy. And they’re unhappy with insecurity, the fact that murder rates are out of control in Venezuela, especially in Caracas. They’re not happy with the fact that the economy is really quite dysfunctional and the fact that there are shortages of many basic goods and the fact that currency controls means that it’s very difficult for any businesses to do anything. And the fact that inflation is so strong means that daily life is often quite, quite difficult for people. And Venezuelans are no different to anybody else, in the sense that they just want—they want good jobs, and they want to be safe. And I think the vote that we saw was a sign that many people are not happy there.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to break and come back to this discussion with Rory Carroll, author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela, also a reporter for The Guardian, and Mark Weisbrot, who’s speaking to us from D.C.—Center for Economic and Policy Research is his organization—an economist. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. Back in a minute.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: You’re listening to Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, as we talk about the results of the election in Venezuela: winning by a very slim margin, Nicolás Maduro, over Henrique Capriles. We urge folks to go to the website, democracynow.org. Our guests are Rory Carroll, author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela and the—of The Guardian, and Mark Weisbrot, Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Mark, your response to the critique of Rory Carroll to what’s happened in Venezuela today?

MARKWEISBROT: Well, first, we don’t want to exaggerate the advantage—or, I’m not even sure the government really had an advantage. You know, their state television has about a 6 percent audience share, so that’s not that much. And, you know, they even showed commercials for Capriles, for the opposition candidate, on state TV. And so—and then, of course, the print media is very much against the government, and the radio is probably against the government, as well. And so—and, of course, most of the wealth and income of the country is in the hands of the opposition, and they had plenty of ads. They were very sophisticated, very—a lot of resources. They ran a very good campaign. They did the same thing in the last election. So, I think this is a fairly level playing field compared especially to other—the average election in Latin America. I mean, look at Mexico, for example, where you had the media really determine the outcome of the election in 2006, and probably 2012, as well. where the left-of-center candidate doesn’t even have a chance, you know, with that kind of media duopoly as 95 percent of the media. So, this is a competitive election.

And I do think that there are serious problems the government has to deal with, and this is—this should be a wake-up call for them. I mean, you know, what happened since the last election that I think might have moved some of the 3 or 4 percent that moved from Chávez to the other camp was the economy deteriorated some—you know, the shortages that Rory was talking about. This is a problem mostly in the exchange rate system that has been badly managed. So, I think they need to stabilize the exchange rate. They need to make sure that foreign exchange is available, like it was. You know, you had a recovery. I mean, the economy has been growing for almost three years now. And so, it began to grow in—after the world recession and the recession they had in the middle of 2010. And it grew, and growth accelerated, and inflation was actually falling, right up to the last—almost to the last election, while the economy accelerated. And so, you didn’t have other problems that you’ve had in the last five months with the shortages, and so—and the increasing inflation you’ve had in the last few months. So I think that, definitely, the government needs to stabilize the exchange rate. They need to bring inflation down. And those two things together will get rid of the shortages, as they have in the past. They’ve reduced them and gotten rid of them at some points. And I think that’s some of the things they’re going to have to do. And they have to keep the economy growing and employment growing.

I think they—you know, if the other side would have won, you would have had a classic austerity plan immediately, and they would have brought down inflation by having a recession. I hope that this government doesn’t do that. They would have brought down imports, as well, the same way. I think this government can in fact resolve the problems of the exchange rate system and inflation while allowing the economy to grow, as they were doing right up to the last quarter of last year.

AMYGOODMAN: Rory Carroll, I wanted to get your response to Mark, as well as this comment. Following Chávez’s death last month, we spoke to Carol Delgado, the Venezuelan consul general in New York. She had returned to Caracas for the state funeral and praised Chávez’s work for the poor.

CAROLDELGADO: Venezuela has reduced poverty dramatically, particularly extreme poverty. Venezuelans right now have education, free up to the university level. We have free, universal health for everyone. And those kind of achievements are fantastic.

AMYGOODMAN: Rory Carroll, your response?

RORYCARROLL: Certainly there have been impressive social gains made in the past 10 years, but unfortunately there’s a problem of sustainability, and a lot of those social gains appear to be fraying. Those deep falls in poverty appear to have more or less halted, or certainly slowed very much, since 2010, and in social programs. If you visit public hospitals in Venezuela, as I’ve done many times, it’s pretty Dickensian, in terms of—there’s broken glass. Often there are power shortages in the hospitals. People have to bring their own medicines. They have to bring their own bedsheets. Criminals can break into hospitals and threaten staff. And these are—these are the main public hospitals in Caracas that we’re talking about. If you go outside the capital, it can be even more grim. So, I think there has to be a bit of a health warning, if you like, over some of the acclaim for some of these social programs, unfortunately.

That said, yes, poverty has fallen, and people have more money in their pockets, so they—and that’s great. But the country is increasingly lost in a labyrinth of petro populism. You need just to look at the statistics about the dependence on oil exports. I mean, now they’re about 94 percent dependent on—for their foreign revenue, revenue on oil exports. And the reason for that—or the consequence of that is that there really—there are hidden degrees of unemployment, because factories are—especially state-owned factories are either working at half capacity—I went to Ciudad Guayana, the industrial heartland of Venezuela, and there’s a whole chapter in the book about that, which shows that this great kind of manufacturing potential that Venezuela has has really been squandered.

AMYGOODMAN: Rory, I wanted—I wanted to ask you something. In your own newspaper, The Guardian, it said infant mortality is now lower than in 1999, from a rate of 20 per thousand live births to 13 in 2011; that poverty has decreased, in 1999 23.4 percent of the population recorded as being in extreme poverty, fell to 8.5 percent in 2011, according to official government figures. Can you talk about your trajectory of changing your view of Hugo Chávez when you first went down as a reporter and what made you shift to your critique of him?

RORYCARROLL: Yeah, I did—I was there for six years, from 2006 'til last year, full time, although I still regularly visit. And I think, for me, the leitmotif is waste, wasted opportunity, that with Hugo Chávez, it was an immensely gifted politician, and he had such a strong mandate, he had—he had the great fortune to coincide with this explosion in oil revenues, and there was such goodwill behind him, and yet—and he was such a brilliant campaigner, but unfortunately, as a governor, as a ruler, he was—he was incompetent. And he more or less admitted this towards the end. I mean, he was asked one time, "Do have any regrets?" And he thought about it, and he said, "Well, mi gestión," you know, most like "My management." And we could—we see that in this kind of profound dysfunction. And just one example will be the infrastructure, the fact that they neglected to invest in infrastructure or maintain it, as the result of which now there are power cuts all the time, especially outside the city, outside Caracas. And yet the government, under Hugo Chávez and also now Nicolás Maduro, they resort to these kind of surreal excuses, like they blame mercenaries or maybe the CIA for sabotage, rather than the fact—the more banal fact is that this reflects a decade of mismanagement. And that applies really to the wider economy. And I just think it's a wasted opportunity, because you just look further south to Brazil, and you can see there how they’ve made increasing—just as impressive reductions in poverty that are clearly much more sustainable.

AMYGOODMAN: I wanted to turn to, well, at the time Foreign Minister Maduro in our studio. Juan González and I interviewed the new elected president, Nicolás Maduro, in October of 2007. This was during the Bush years, when he served as Chávez’s foreign minister. It was a year after Chávez had famously referred to then-President George W. Bush as the devil in a speech before the United Nations, saying, quote, "The devil came here yesterday. It smells like sulfur today." I asked Maduro what message he had for the United States.

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what’s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.

Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it’s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That’s the main message, and that’s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.

AMYGOODMAN: That was Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro, who was just elected president yesterday in Venezuela. Mark Weisbrot, if you could tell us exactly who Nicolás Maduro is, where he comes from, and the significance of this election, and if you think, in the call for the recount, is it possible that they would come up with different figures, since this was such a razor-slim margin that he won by yesterday?

MARKWEISBROT: Yes, well, it wasn’t that slim. I mean, it was 1.6 percentage points and around 300,000 votes, so it’s not going to be changed. And, I mean, it’s—anything is possible. There could have been some mistake, but it’s just really, really, really unlikely. And given the secure system they, I—and Maduro has said, by the way, you know, Capriles asked for 100 percent of the ballots instead of the—normally do like 54 percent, which is way more than you need. And he said, basically, yes. So, I don’t think there’s going to be any doubt.

In terms of Maduro, you know, he was the foreign minister for six years. He did a pretty good job, really. I think most people would recognize that. He comes from a left background. He was a union organizer and a bus driver. And I think he’s going to continue, you know, a lot of the same policies.

I want to just respond to Rory, if I can, because I think he presented what you see in the media every day. Now, he didn’t challenge the statistics that you gave on poverty and extreme poverty, and nobody does, but these are—you know, and those are huge changes in people’s lives, you know? And, of course, all the other changes that we talked about—employment. I didn’t even mention income, real income growth. But instead, the media focuses on everything that’s bad. I mean, you could do that with the Clinton years. You know, Clinton presided over the largest economic—longest economic expansion in U.S. history, and there were still a lot of bad things, you know, going on in the United States, even though unemployment hit record lows and, you know, poverty reduced sharply—and it came back, by the way, after he was gone. But, you know, this is just presenting this completely one-sided picture that you see every single day. Yeah, the public hospitals deteriorated, but that’s one of the reasons why they created—because they couldn’t control the health ministry, so that’s why they created the misiones to provide healthcare for millions of people there. And so, yeah, you know, there’s no doubt that Rory’s talking about problems—there were serious problems in administration. But to say that—you know, to just say that this was a failure? I mean, if you look at Venezuela the 20 years prior to Chávez, where the economy actually shrank in a per capita basis, I mean, this is a huge improvement in people’s living standards. And that’s why they’ve won 15 out of the last 16 elections. It’s not, as the media would have it, just because Chávez was a great performer and had a lot of charisma. I think that’s very important for people to understand.

AMYGOODMAN: Rory Carroll, on the issue of those statistics, the figures that I just read, according to your own paper and to the government figures, the serious reduction in extreme poverty, your response to that?

RORYCARROLL: Yes. Well, I think—I mean, those are the function of two things. One is the oil prices increased from about $8 or $9 a barrel when Hugo Chávez took over; in 1999, they exploded up to more than $100 a barrel. And this put huge amounts of money into the Venezuelan treasury. And we saw in the 1970s, during a previous boom, that there are falls in poverty and that this generates lots of money in the economy. And Venezuela, above all, is a petro state. And that, in a sense, the—this fall of poverty, in many ways, reflected that. But it did also reflect the lavish spending that Hugo Chávez’s government did with this boom. They spent very generously on social programs, and rightly so. They invested a lot on reducing poverty, and that’s all great.

The problem, the catch—and it’s a big one—is that the way they did it was clearly not sustainable. And many of—instead of building an economy that—with real jobs, which would give the poor people like a permanent leg up, I think we see a lot of the money has been spent on subsidies, the fact that gasoline is basically free—which is, in a way, a regressive subsidy: It benefits the middle class more than the poor. The fact that so many prices are kind of frozen and that they have to send out the police and the army to try to enforce these price controls is just one indication of just how things are distorted there. And as Mark himself said, I mean, for example, they couldn’t control the health ministry. Well, why not? I mean, they were the health ministry. And that’s reflective of the wider dysfunction in the government. And therein lies the tragedy.

AMYGOODMAN: Mark Weisbrot—

MARKWEISBROT: Can I respond to that? Yeah. First of all—

AMYGOODMAN: If you would respond, and also if you could talk about what has been the U.S. role in Venezuela.

MARKWEISBROT: Yeah, that’s very important, too. I mean, that’s—well, but first let’s talk about sustainability. For 14 years, all of the media, and especially the business press, you know, 90 percent of the media, has been predicting economic collapse in Venezuela. They’ve always said it’s unsustainable. You know, I have these debates with opposition economists, and they don’t dispute any of the statistics; all they say is next year it’s going to collapse. Well, they’ve been saying this for 14 years, and it hasn’t collapsed yet. They’ve had two recessions. One was caused by an opposition oil strike in 2002 and 2003—certainly not the government’s fault—and the other that was caused at the—in 2009 and half of 2010 that was brought on by the world recession. So, it’s not going to collapse. This idea of sustainability, that’s just saying, you know, "We hope it collapses, and it’s going to collapse some day, and we hope it’s soon." And it’s not going to. And, you know, they don’t have an unsustainable debt. So, unsustainable is like what we had in 2006, when you had an $8 trillion housing bubble, and everybody who was looking at it, which unfortunately wasn’t most economists, could tell you that it was going to burst and it was going to cause a huge recession, OK? They don’t have those kinds of imbalances. They have a problem: You know, they have inflation, and inflation is higher than their trading partners, and so that appreciates their real exchange rate, and that’s why you had a devaluation. And this is an ongoing problem that they have to fix. But that isn’t like what we had, where you have a giant bubble, asset bubble, collapses, and you get a great recession out of it. So, this is all—a lot of this is really exaggerated.

Now, the other question about the U.S. role, that’s very important, because, you know, Rory points to Brazil and says, "Well, they were able to do a lot of nice things, and they didn’t have this polarization and conflict and all these things that we don’t like." Well, that’s great, but they weren’t facing the same kind of opposition that had, you know, according to Petkoff—Teodoro Petkoff, a leader of the opposition himself, said they had a strategy of military overthrow from 1999 to 2003, OK? Brazil didn’t have that. They had the military—was as nationalistic as the government. And they had—they didn’t have the United States, on the side of this—not only the military, but the opposition—telling them all along and pouring money in there and saying, "You just—you know, we get rid of everybody we don’t like in this region, and you just hang in there, and you don’t have to deal with this guy. You don’t have to be part of a government. You can boycott the 2005 elections," as they did for the National Assembly. "You can pretend that the 2004 referendum was stolen," even though Jimmy Carter—the Carter Center certified it, and so did the OAS. This is what Chávez had to deal with.

So, yeah, he was a polarizing figure, if you want to say that, but he was dealing with people who, every time he offered them an olive branch, they just slapped him in the face. And they had no intention of ever dealing with him. And, you know, in that sense, you can say there’s progress, because here, at least, you know, they’re participating in elections. They started doing that in 2006. And they have started accepting the results. So there’s some progress there. But again, you know, this is the U.S. main—as I said, it’s the number one or two target for regime change. The opposition knows that. And they don’t feel like there’s any reason to work with the government the way the opposition in Brazil does.

AMYGOODMAN: Rory Carroll, your quick response, as we wrap up?

RORYCARROLL: Well, I think there’s so much bluster, really, in terms of the U.S.-Venezuelan relationship. Venezuela continues, and has always, under Chávez, and will continue to do so, sells oil to the United States. Companies like Chevron operate in Venezuela. And the United States will continue to buy Venezuela’s oil. And I think the U.S.'s shameful role in the 2002 coup has been well documented, but that was, you know, more than a decade ago. And I think this heightened rhetorical attacks between—from Caracas really have been—served largely now as a distraction, and the fact that we saw it reaching kind of surreal levels with Nicolás Maduro basically accusing the CIA or the United States of poisoning Hugo Chávez, of giving him cancer, and really—and that's ridiculous.

AMYGOODMAN: Mark Weisbrot, on that one issue of the charges and the belief of many in Venezuela that the United States killed Hugo Chávez?

MARKWEISBROT: Well, they haven’t presented any evidence, so until they do I can’t say that it has any validity. But I can understand why people would believe it. How many times did they try to kill Castro? And how many times have they, you know, done things like this? They have a—White House has a kill list where they kill people they don’t like every week. So, yeah, I mean, I can see why the people would believe that, but I have no idea whether there’s any validity to it.

AMYGOODMAN: Well, we’re going to leave it there, but we’re going to, of course, continue to follow politics in Venezuela. I want to thank Mark Weisbrot from the Center for Economic and Policy Research and Rory Carroll, author of Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela. He also writes for The Guardian newspaper.

This is Democracy Now! When we come back, well, it’s Tax Day, and we’ll speak with a tax resister. Stay with us.

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Mon, 15 Apr 2013 00:00:00 -0400Hugo Chávez Funeral: Derided by US Media, Venezuelan Leader Uplifted Poor from Caracas to the Bronxhttp://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/8/hugo_chavez_funeral_derided_by_us
tag:democracynow.org,2013-03-08:en/story/1aef6d AMY GOODMAN : We begin today&#8217;s show in Venezuela, where millions are gathering to mourn the late President Hugo Chávez on the day of the funeral. Chávez, who led the country for 14 years, died Tuesday after a two-year battle with cancer. The head of Venezuela&#8217;s presidential guard told the Associated Press Chávez died of a massive heart attack triggered by his advanced stage of cancer. More than two million people have already come to pay their respects, standing in lines miles long for hours to see him lying in state.
Speaking Thursday, acting President Nicolás Maduro announced a seven-day extension in the mourning period and said Chávez&#8217;s body would be embalmed and put on display in a military museum following today&#8217;s funeral.
ACTING PRESIDENT NICOLÁS MADURO : [translated] I want to tell the people and the world it has been decided that the body of the comandante will be embalmed so that it remains eternally on view for the people at the museum, as Ho Chi Minh is, as Lenin is, as Mao Zedong is. The body of our comandante-in-chief, embalmed in the Museum of the Revolution, in a special way, so he can be in a glass case, and our people can have him there present always and always with the people.
AMY GOODMAN : Acting Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro speaking on Thursday.
More than 30 world leaders, mostly from Latin America and the Caribbean, are expected to attend the funeral, including Cuban President Raúl Castro, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, Bolivian President Evo Morales, Argentine President Cristina Kirchner, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
We go now to Caracas to speak with Carol Delgado, the Venezuelan consul general in New York. She has returned to her home city to pay her respects to President Chávez and attend the funeral.
Carol Delgado, welcome to Democracy Now! Can you explain what&#8217;s happening in the streets of Caracas right now?
CAROL DELGADO : Yeah, thanks for having me, Amy, and thanks for the wonderful, the outstanding job that you are doing by telling the truth to the Americans.
What is happening here in Caracas is that it&#8217;s—there is like a mix between a huge international summit with 50 heads of state from all over the world coming in [inaudible]—
AMY GOODMAN : Carol, if you could speak as loud as you possibly can, because it&#8217;s a little difficult to hear you. If you could speak as loud as you can—there&#8217;s a loud generator sound in the background.
CAROL DELGADO : Yeah, Amy. Here in Venezuela, over two million people have gone to the streets with all their love. I think it&#8217;s important to highlight that for Venezuelans this is not the death of the president; this is the death of a family person, of our father. And that&#8217;s what Venezuelans feel. And they have gone to the streets to accompany, to say their last goodbye to President Chávez. But something outstanding that I got to see yesterday night is that there was a long line of over 30,000 people awaiting to give their last word to a coffin where President Chávez is. And you could see, you know, his face, and also the coffin has a Venezuelan flag. And it&#8217;s a very touching thing. People are going there. They are giving President Chávez the honors.
But it&#8217;s very important to highlight that this is like a sort of popular mass, where the people feel that they are going to go to mourn a father or go to mourn a preacher, basically somebody who is very important to them. And also you see that the people—most of the people who are there are the disenfranchised, the poor people of Venezuela, and that felt—feel that they have come to existence after Chávez came into the Venezuelan society in 1992, after the coup. So, for these people, it&#8217;s like Chávez—
AMY GOODMAN : Did you know him personally?
CAROL DELGADO : Yeah, yeah, I had the privilege of knowing him personally, yeah. Yeah, I had an opportunity to talk to him about the popular power. And as you know, President Chávez has been fostering a new—a new way of democracy, the participatory democracy, giving directly a participatory body, so that people can cope with the problems they have in their communities. And in the month of International Women&#8217;s Day, I think it&#8217;s important to highlight that 60 percent of women are the ones leading this participatory democracy in Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN : Carol Delgado, I was wondering your response to the criticism. I wanted to play a clip for you from Michael Shifter . We spoke to him on Wednesday. He&#8217;s president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C. He criticized Chávez on a number of issues, including his handling of Venezuelans&#8217; economy. Listen to what Michael Shifter says and then respond.
MICHAEL SHIFTER : He really had an opportunity to reshape in a significant way and put the country on a sustainable path of development. I&#8217;m not sure that if one looks at Venezuela today that it&#8217;s on that path. And I think you have enormous problems that are there. There are shortages of basic goods. There is the highest inflation rate in Latin America. Crime is off the charts. If you look at the crime rate when he came in versus the crime rate today, there&#8217;s tremendous insecurity. Caracas is one of the most crime-ridden cities in the world today. So, this is not a government that I think has been very competent and very effective.
AMY GOODMAN : Your response to Michael Shifter, Carol Delgado, consul general of Venezuela in New York, though today in her home city of Caracas for the funeral?
CAROL DELGADO : I believe that for Americans it&#8217;s very difficult to understand what&#8217;s happening here, because they don&#8217;t understand what culture is going on here. When we talk about violence, I think it&#8217;s important to highlight that there are systemic reasons why the violence is a problem in Venezuela. And poverty took a very important toll on Venezuela. And many of the people who are now criminals were kids that didn&#8217;t have to eat, that were fed with bottles with water and the powder and sugar. So, that&#8217;s not happening. Venezuela has reduced poverty dramatically, particularly extreme poverty. Venezuelans right now have education, free up to the university level. We have free, universal health for everyone. And those kind of achievements are fantastic.
I think it&#8217;s very difficult for Michael Shifter and for many Americans to understand Venezuelans, because they don&#8217;t understand about the religiosity, about the connection that President Chávez has been able to engage with the people of Venezuela. And I think this is a process that will continue. We&#8217;ll continue building socialism. We don&#8217;t have all the answers. There are many things to be done, and done better, but we&#8217;re on a path. We didn&#8217;t have a plan to develop the country, and now we do. So I think President Chávez has left this process with a path, a path. We&#8217;re working on industrialization of the country. We&#8217;re working on food sovereignty. And those are achievements that are undeniable.
AMY GOODMAN : Carol Delgado, if—
CAROL DELGADO : I think also I should highlight that when I see—
AMY GOODMAN : Go ahead.
CAROL DELGADO : Yeah, when you see the people that were yesterday trying to say, &quot;President, te amo . President, I love you. President, I will continue fighting. President, I will devote my life to the ideas to the development of Venezuela,&quot; when you can see that force, because the people in America cannot see the power of love, the genuine love that people feel.
And also, the Venezuelan people have coming of age, have becoming adults. We are not children anymore. We understand about politics. We understand about the economy. We understand about how our country is ruled. Now we have control over—have control on our oil resources, which we didn&#8217;t have in the past. Eighty-four percent of our oil resources went to corporations, went basically abroad of the country; it wouldn&#8217;t—that money wouldn&#8217;t stay here. So we have recovered our independence and recovered our oil.
And we are determined to continue building and consolidating the process that President Chávez and Simón Bolívar and many other leaders started. But not only in Venezuela, also seeing—you know, following his teachings on solidarity, which is building something—building a better world, but together with the peoples of Latin America. And I think it&#8217;s very important to highlight that many countries of Latin America and of the world, like Nigeria and many countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, have declared this official mourning from one day to—until up to seven days of official mourning. So, I think it&#8217;s despite of the media lies and the lies of—that this is the truth of democracy, the truth of—the truth of the lies of media conglomerates all over the world.
AMY GOODMAN : Carol Delgado, I wanted to read a quote of an AP reporter. This was highlighted by the media group Fairness &amp; Accuracy in Reporting , which was criticizing the extremely anti-Chávez coverage in the United States. And they said, &quot;One of the more bizarre takes on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez&#8217;s death comes from Associated Press business reporter Pamela Sampson.&quot;
This is what Pamela Sampson wrote on March 5th . She said, &quot;Chavez invested Venezuela&#8217;s oil wealth into social programs including state-run food markets, cash benefits for poor families, free health clinics and education programs. But those gains were meager compared with the spectacular construction projects that oil riches spurred in glittering Middle Eastern cities, including the world&#8217;s tallest building in Dubai and plans for branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim museums in Abu Dhabi.&quot;
Again, that&#8217;s the AP business reporter Pamela Sampson offering her criticism of Chávez&#8217;s choice of investing Venezuela&#8217;s oil wealth into free health clinics and education instead of the world&#8217;s tallest building. Carol Delgado?
CAROL DELGADO : We cannot—Venezuela cannot afford to have a new generation of people who will continue enlarging this criminal thing. We have to feed our people, because these people are going hungry every night. The people cannot wait until people think it&#8217;s right. I think President Chávez has done the moral choice by understanding that his people need to be nourished, his people need to be fed, his people need to have access to health, have access to education. And I just don&#8217;t understand, I don&#8217;t agree with, you know, this neoliberal party that says that the state cannot invest on social programs.
That&#8217;s something that we have decided and we will continue doing, because we believe that it&#8217;s paramount and also that we have to show the people of the world that you can do many things with not so much money, because when you give people the self—sense of self-esteem—many people have said that President Chávez is a populist. When I had the opportunity to speak yesterday to the people who were mourning President Chávez outside of the military academy where his body is resting, you get to see—they told me, &quot;They underestimate us. They think that we are just ignorant people because we are poor people. We know what things are about, because President Chávez was able to teach the people, the poor people, the disenfranchised, about becoming powerful and becoming—daring to become leaders in their communities, to make decisions.&quot; So that&#8217;s something that&#8217;s difficult for people in the North to understand.
AMY GOODMAN : Carol Delgado, can you talk about what happens to Venezuela now? After the funeral, Vice President—Vice President Maduro will be sworn in as the president. He&#8217;s been acting president since Tuesday of Venezuela. Then talk about what is the next course of action, when will elections be held, and what direction you see Venezuela going. And what about the fierce opposition to Chávez? How will that, do you think, express itself?
CAROL DELGADO : Well, according the Supreme Court, Chávez didn&#8217;t have to swear in, because he was already a president. So, because of that, President Maduro will be sworn in today as acting president, and a new election has to be called, according to what the constitution, the Venezuelan constitution, says. But it&#8217;s important also to highlight that for President Chávez, Maduro was the best political leader, the person that, in his judgment, in his opinion, was the best person to lead the continuity of the revolutionary process in Venezuela, and also was the person able to accompany all this international movement of progressive governments that are working together to achieve better standards of living for our people and to the socialism.
AMY GOODMAN : And the elections, when will they be held? Nicolás Maduro, we assume, will run for president. What do you expect to play out there? This will happen in April?
CAROL DELGADO : There is no date defined yet, at least not known to the public. But the constitution says that a new election has to be called within 30 days. So, I think that&#8217;s something that&#8217;s going to be happening probably in the next hours, in the next days. But already the several serious polls in Venezuela say that Nicolás Maduro, as a candidate, will have the lead against any opposition candidate that the opposition will want to put to run against the candidate of the Socialist Party, the Venezuelan Socialist Party.
AMY GOODMAN : Finally, President Chávez gave cheap oil to countries throughout Latin America and to people in the United States, as well, through Citgo, the Venezuelan oil company. I have seen many ads of Joe Kennedy, the former congressmember, the son of Robert Kennedy, the former attorney general, congratulating President Chávez for what he has done in this country. There was a mourning—a vigil in the South Bronx, people who got heating oil from the Venezuelan government, from President Chávez. Will that program continue in the United States?
CAROL DELGADO : Yeah, I think it&#8217;s very important to highlight the vision that President Chávez had. We cannot solve all the problems that the poor in the U.S. have, but we can share what we have. No matter if it&#8217;s too much, it&#8217;s too little, we can share what we have. Despite of the economic crisis, the world economic crisis, that has hit Venezuela, as well, President Chávez was determined to keep the program of heating oil, because it&#8217;s a way of giving something from the Venezuelan hearts to the hearts of the people of the U.S., which he always highlight that it was different, the people of the U.S., than the positions of the U.S. government. That was something very differentiated.
But I think the vision of solidarity is something that is important to highlight. It&#8217;s different of charity. Charity is perhaps knowing that somebody is hungry and giving a quarter and thinking that the world is OK. So that&#8217;s not the vision of solidarity. Solidarity is that you have to share what you have. No matter how much you have, no matter how little you have, you always have to share. And that&#8217;s something that President Chávez was very clear about.
AMY GOODMAN : Finally, Carol Delgado, your thoughts today on International Women&#8217;s Day, which is also the funeral of President Chávez, where he put women, what value he placed on women participating in the Venezuelan governance, in Venezuelan government?
CAROL DELGADO : President Chávez always supported women and—in Venezuela during most of his presidency. In Venezuela we have five branches of power. And in most of his presidency, four branches of power were presided, were led by women. Today, we still have some powers led by women, and also we have many women ministers. I think at least half of the executive of President Chávez are women. But, of course, we also have the 30,000 communal council who are 60, 65 percent led by women. So I think the revolution rests a great deal on the work, on the consciousness, on the determination of women of Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN : Carol Delgado, we want to thank you for joining us. Carol Delgado is the Venezuelan consul general here in New York City, but she is joining us from her home city of Caracas, where President Chávez&#8217;s funeral is taking place in just a few hours today. His body will lay in state for seven days. The period has been extended because millions have come to pay their respects from around Venezuela. His body will be embalmed in a military museum.
This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . As we continue International Women&#8217;s Day with the voices of women, we go to Washington. It&#8217;s just hours after President Obama signed the Violence Against Women Act, and we&#8217;re going to talk about what it means. Stay with us. AMYGOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Venezuela, where millions are gathering to mourn the late President Hugo Chávez on the day of the funeral. Chávez, who led the country for 14 years, died Tuesday after a two-year battle with cancer. The head of Venezuela’s presidential guard told the Associated Press Chávez died of a massive heart attack triggered by his advanced stage of cancer. More than two million people have already come to pay their respects, standing in lines miles long for hours to see him lying in state.

Speaking Thursday, acting President Nicolás Maduro announced a seven-day extension in the mourning period and said Chávez’s body would be embalmed and put on display in a military museum following today’s funeral.

ACTINGPRESIDENT NICOLÁS MADURO: [translated] I want to tell the people and the world it has been decided that the body of the comandante will be embalmed so that it remains eternally on view for the people at the museum, as Ho Chi Minh is, as Lenin is, as Mao Zedong is. The body of our comandante-in-chief, embalmed in the Museum of the Revolution, in a special way, so he can be in a glass case, and our people can have him there present always and always with the people.

More than 30 world leaders, mostly from Latin America and the Caribbean, are expected to attend the funeral, including Cuban President Raúl Castro, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, Bolivian President Evo Morales, Argentine President Cristina Kirchner, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

We go now to Caracas to speak with Carol Delgado, the Venezuelan consul general in New York. She has returned to her home city to pay her respects to President Chávez and attend the funeral.

Carol Delgado, welcome to Democracy Now! Can you explain what’s happening in the streets of Caracas right now?

CAROLDELGADO: Yeah, thanks for having me, Amy, and thanks for the wonderful, the outstanding job that you are doing by telling the truth to the Americans.

What is happening here in Caracas is that it’s—there is like a mix between a huge international summit with 50 heads of state from all over the world coming in [inaudible]—

AMYGOODMAN: Carol, if you could speak as loud as you possibly can, because it’s a little difficult to hear you. If you could speak as loud as you can—there’s a loud generator sound in the background.

CAROLDELGADO: Yeah, Amy. Here in Venezuela, over two million people have gone to the streets with all their love. I think it’s important to highlight that for Venezuelans this is not the death of the president; this is the death of a family person, of our father. And that’s what Venezuelans feel. And they have gone to the streets to accompany, to say their last goodbye to President Chávez. But something outstanding that I got to see yesterday night is that there was a long line of over 30,000 people awaiting to give their last word to a coffin where President Chávez is. And you could see, you know, his face, and also the coffin has a Venezuelan flag. And it’s a very touching thing. People are going there. They are giving President Chávez the honors.

But it’s very important to highlight that this is like a sort of popular mass, where the people feel that they are going to go to mourn a father or go to mourn a preacher, basically somebody who is very important to them. And also you see that the people—most of the people who are there are the disenfranchised, the poor people of Venezuela, and that felt—feel that they have come to existence after Chávez came into the Venezuelan society in 1992, after the coup. So, for these people, it’s like Chávez—

AMYGOODMAN: Did you know him personally?

CAROLDELGADO: Yeah, yeah, I had the privilege of knowing him personally, yeah. Yeah, I had an opportunity to talk to him about the popular power. And as you know, President Chávez has been fostering a new—a new way of democracy, the participatory democracy, giving directly a participatory body, so that people can cope with the problems they have in their communities. And in the month of International Women’s Day, I think it’s important to highlight that 60 percent of women are the ones leading this participatory democracy in Venezuela.

AMYGOODMAN: Carol Delgado, I was wondering your response to the criticism. I wanted to play a clip for you from Michael Shifter. We spoke to him on Wednesday. He’s president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C. He criticized Chávez on a number of issues, including his handling of Venezuelans’ economy. Listen to what Michael Shifter says and then respond.

MICHAELSHIFTER: He really had an opportunity to reshape in a significant way and put the country on a sustainable path of development. I’m not sure that if one looks at Venezuela today that it’s on that path. And I think you have enormous problems that are there. There are shortages of basic goods. There is the highest inflation rate in Latin America. Crime is off the charts. If you look at the crime rate when he came in versus the crime rate today, there’s tremendous insecurity. Caracas is one of the most crime-ridden cities in the world today. So, this is not a government that I think has been very competent and very effective.

AMYGOODMAN: Your response to Michael Shifter, Carol Delgado, consul general of Venezuela in New York, though today in her home city of Caracas for the funeral?

CAROLDELGADO: I believe that for Americans it’s very difficult to understand what’s happening here, because they don’t understand what culture is going on here. When we talk about violence, I think it’s important to highlight that there are systemic reasons why the violence is a problem in Venezuela. And poverty took a very important toll on Venezuela. And many of the people who are now criminals were kids that didn’t have to eat, that were fed with bottles with water and the powder and sugar. So, that’s not happening. Venezuela has reduced poverty dramatically, particularly extreme poverty. Venezuelans right now have education, free up to the university level. We have free, universal health for everyone. And those kind of achievements are fantastic.

I think it’s very difficult for Michael Shifter and for many Americans to understand Venezuelans, because they don’t understand about the religiosity, about the connection that President Chávez has been able to engage with the people of Venezuela. And I think this is a process that will continue. We’ll continue building socialism. We don’t have all the answers. There are many things to be done, and done better, but we’re on a path. We didn’t have a plan to develop the country, and now we do. So I think President Chávez has left this process with a path, a path. We’re working on industrialization of the country. We’re working on food sovereignty. And those are achievements that are undeniable.

AMYGOODMAN: Carol Delgado, if—

CAROLDELGADO: I think also I should highlight that when I see—

AMYGOODMAN: Go ahead.

CAROLDELGADO: Yeah, when you see the people that were yesterday trying to say, "President, te amo. President, I love you. President, I will continue fighting. President, I will devote my life to the ideas to the development of Venezuela," when you can see that force, because the people in America cannot see the power of love, the genuine love that people feel.

And also, the Venezuelan people have coming of age, have becoming adults. We are not children anymore. We understand about politics. We understand about the economy. We understand about how our country is ruled. Now we have control over—have control on our oil resources, which we didn’t have in the past. Eighty-four percent of our oil resources went to corporations, went basically abroad of the country; it wouldn’t—that money wouldn’t stay here. So we have recovered our independence and recovered our oil.

And we are determined to continue building and consolidating the process that President Chávez and Simón Bolívar and many other leaders started. But not only in Venezuela, also seeing—you know, following his teachings on solidarity, which is building something—building a better world, but together with the peoples of Latin America. And I think it’s very important to highlight that many countries of Latin America and of the world, like Nigeria and many countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, have declared this official mourning from one day to—until up to seven days of official mourning. So, I think it’s despite of the media lies and the lies of—that this is the truth of democracy, the truth of—the truth of the lies of media conglomerates all over the world.

AMYGOODMAN: Carol Delgado, I wanted to read a quote of an AP reporter. This was highlighted by the media group Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting, which was criticizing the extremely anti-Chávez coverage in the United States. And they said, "One of the more bizarre takes on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s death comes from Associated Press business reporter Pamela Sampson."

This is what Pamela Sampson wrote on March 5th. She said, "Chavez invested Venezuela’s oil wealth into social programs including state-run food markets, cash benefits for poor families, free health clinics and education programs. But those gains were meager compared with the spectacular construction projects that oil riches spurred in glittering Middle Eastern cities, including the world’s tallest building in Dubai and plans for branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim museums in Abu Dhabi."

CAROLDELGADO: We cannot—Venezuela cannot afford to have a new generation of people who will continue enlarging this criminal thing. We have to feed our people, because these people are going hungry every night. The people cannot wait until people think it’s right. I think President Chávez has done the moral choice by understanding that his people need to be nourished, his people need to be fed, his people need to have access to health, have access to education. And I just don’t understand, I don’t agree with, you know, this neoliberal party that says that the state cannot invest on social programs.

That’s something that we have decided and we will continue doing, because we believe that it’s paramount and also that we have to show the people of the world that you can do many things with not so much money, because when you give people the self—sense of self-esteem—many people have said that President Chávez is a populist. When I had the opportunity to speak yesterday to the people who were mourning President Chávez outside of the military academy where his body is resting, you get to see—they told me, "They underestimate us. They think that we are just ignorant people because we are poor people. We know what things are about, because President Chávez was able to teach the people, the poor people, the disenfranchised, about becoming powerful and becoming—daring to become leaders in their communities, to make decisions." So that’s something that’s difficult for people in the North to understand.

AMYGOODMAN: Carol Delgado, can you talk about what happens to Venezuela now? After the funeral, Vice President—Vice President Maduro will be sworn in as the president. He’s been acting president since Tuesday of Venezuela. Then talk about what is the next course of action, when will elections be held, and what direction you see Venezuela going. And what about the fierce opposition to Chávez? How will that, do you think, express itself?

CAROLDELGADO: Well, according the Supreme Court, Chávez didn’t have to swear in, because he was already a president. So, because of that, President Maduro will be sworn in today as acting president, and a new election has to be called, according to what the constitution, the Venezuelan constitution, says. But it’s important also to highlight that for President Chávez, Maduro was the best political leader, the person that, in his judgment, in his opinion, was the best person to lead the continuity of the revolutionary process in Venezuela, and also was the person able to accompany all this international movement of progressive governments that are working together to achieve better standards of living for our people and to the socialism.

AMYGOODMAN: And the elections, when will they be held? Nicolás Maduro, we assume, will run for president. What do you expect to play out there? This will happen in April?

CAROLDELGADO: There is no date defined yet, at least not known to the public. But the constitution says that a new election has to be called within 30 days. So, I think that’s something that’s going to be happening probably in the next hours, in the next days. But already the several serious polls in Venezuela say that Nicolás Maduro, as a candidate, will have the lead against any opposition candidate that the opposition will want to put to run against the candidate of the Socialist Party, the Venezuelan Socialist Party.

AMYGOODMAN: Finally, President Chávez gave cheap oil to countries throughout Latin America and to people in the United States, as well, through Citgo, the Venezuelan oil company. I have seen many ads of Joe Kennedy, the former congressmember, the son of Robert Kennedy, the former attorney general, congratulating President Chávez for what he has done in this country. There was a mourning—a vigil in the South Bronx, people who got heating oil from the Venezuelan government, from President Chávez. Will that program continue in the United States?

CAROLDELGADO: Yeah, I think it’s very important to highlight the vision that President Chávez had. We cannot solve all the problems that the poor in the U.S. have, but we can share what we have. No matter if it’s too much, it’s too little, we can share what we have. Despite of the economic crisis, the world economic crisis, that has hit Venezuela, as well, President Chávez was determined to keep the program of heating oil, because it’s a way of giving something from the Venezuelan hearts to the hearts of the people of the U.S., which he always highlight that it was different, the people of the U.S., than the positions of the U.S. government. That was something very differentiated.

But I think the vision of solidarity is something that is important to highlight. It’s different of charity. Charity is perhaps knowing that somebody is hungry and giving a quarter and thinking that the world is OK. So that’s not the vision of solidarity. Solidarity is that you have to share what you have. No matter how much you have, no matter how little you have, you always have to share. And that’s something that President Chávez was very clear about.

AMYGOODMAN: Finally, Carol Delgado, your thoughts today on International Women’s Day, which is also the funeral of President Chávez, where he put women, what value he placed on women participating in the Venezuelan governance, in Venezuelan government?

CAROLDELGADO: President Chávez always supported women and—in Venezuela during most of his presidency. In Venezuela we have five branches of power. And in most of his presidency, four branches of power were presided, were led by women. Today, we still have some powers led by women, and also we have many women ministers. I think at least half of the executive of President Chávez are women. But, of course, we also have the 30,000 communal council who are 60, 65 percent led by women. So I think the revolution rests a great deal on the work, on the consciousness, on the determination of women of Venezuela.

AMYGOODMAN: Carol Delgado, we want to thank you for joining us. Carol Delgado is the Venezuelan consul general here in New York City, but she is joining us from her home city of Caracas, where President Chávez’s funeral is taking place in just a few hours today. His body will lay in state for seven days. The period has been extended because millions have come to pay their respects from around Venezuela. His body will be embalmed in a military museum.

This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. As we continue International Women’s Day with the voices of women, we go to Washington. It’s just hours after President Obama signed the Violence Against Women Act, and we’re going to talk about what it means. Stay with us.

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Fri, 08 Mar 2013 00:00:00 -0500Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez Dieshttp://www.democracynow.org/special/venezuelan_president_hugo_chvez_dies
tag:democracynow.org,2015-01-16:in_depth_page/1574bd Photo courtesy Agência Brasil under Creative Commons License Attribution 3.0 Brazil Photo courtesy Agência Brasil under Creative Commons License Attribution 3.0 Brazil]]>
Fri, 16 Jan 2015 14:45:12 -0500Hugo Chávez Dead: Transformed Venezuela & Survived U.S.-Backed Coup, Now Leaves Uncertainty Behindhttp://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/6/hugo_chvez_dead_venezuelan_leader_leaves
tag:democracynow.org,2013-03-06:en/story/020320 JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Venezuela has announced seven days of mourning for its president, Hugo Chávez, who has died at the age of 58. Chávez died after a two-year battle with cancer that was first detected in his pelvis in June of 2011. He had suffered multiple complications following his latest operation in Cuba on December 11th and had not been seen in public since then. News of Chávez&#8217;s death was delivered Tuesday in an emotional address by Vice President Nicolás Maduro.
VICE PRESIDENT NICOLÁS MADURO : [translated] We accompanied his daughters, his brother, his family members, and we received the hardest and the most tragic of news that we will ever transmit to our people: At 4:25 in the afternoon today, the 5th of March, Comandante President Hugo Chávez Frías died.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Hugo Chávez&#8217;s body will be taken in a procession to the Military Academy in Caracas, where it will lie in state until his funeral on Friday. Venezuela&#8217;s schools and universities have been shut for the week. Vice President Maduro will assume the presidency until an election is called within 30 days. Foreign Minister Elías Jaua told state television that Maduro would also be the candidate of Chávez&#8217;s governing United Socialist Party.
FOREIGN MINISTER ELÍAS JAUA : [translated] The president read the constitution correctly on December 8th during his last public speech that he was able to give, and it is clearly established what will follow and what we always defended. He is gone now, and the vice president assumes power, and we hold elections in the next 30 days. That&#8217;s the mandate that Hugo Chávez issued last December 8th, and he asked all of his Bolivarian revolutionaries to accompany Nicolás Maduro in this task. And that is what we are going to do.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Meanwhile, Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles, who was defeated by Chávez last October, offered his condolences to the president&#8217;s family and called for unity as the nation mourns.
HENRIQUE CAPRILES : [translated] To the government, who are burdened with the principal responsibility of guaranteeing coexistence in freedom and in peace, we hope, like all Venezuelans do, that they act in strict accordance with their constitutional duties. And our national armed forces should remain for all, because they belong to everyone, as it is in the constitution and its proud history.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Leaders from around the world sent their condolences to the Chávez family. Some allies, like Ecuador, called for national days of mourning in their own country. This is Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and Peruvian President Ollanta Humala, but first this is Bolivian President Evo Morales remembering Chávez.
PRESIDENT EVO MORALES : [translated] He fought for his country, for the great nation, like Simón Bolívar, a friend who gave his entire life for the liberation of the Venezuelan people, the people of Latin America and all anti-imperialists and anti-capitalists of the world.
PRESIDENT DILMA ROUSSEFF : [translated] On many occasions, the Brazilian government did not completely agree with President Hugo Chávez. But today, as always, we must recognize that he was a great leader, an irreparable loss, and above all, a friend of Brazil, a friend of the Brazilian people.
PRESIDENT OLLANTA HUMALA : [translated] To the Venezuelan people, we wish to express our unity of reflection and our hope that things can progress in a passive manner with the cause of democracy in mind. We want to express our solidarity with the Venezuelan people, with the family of our friend, President Hugo Chávez Frías.
AMY GOODMAN : The presidents of Peru, Bolivia and Brazil.
Here in the United States, President Obama called Chávez&#8217;s passing a &quot;challenging time&quot; for Venezuela. This comes as Vice President Maduro of Venezuela announced Tuesday he is expelling a U.S. embassy military attaché, accusing him of spying on the Venezuelan military and meeting with right-wing military officers in a plan to destabilize Venezuela. Maduro also said a &quot;scientific commission&quot; would look into Chávez&#8217;s death and the possibility his &quot;historical enemies&quot; had somehow induced his cancer.
Well, today we host a roundtable to look at the life of Hugo Chávez, his legacy and what may come next for Venezuela. We&#8217;ll begin in California, where we&#8217;re joined by Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College of Claremont, California, author of The Enduring Legacy: Oil, Culture, and Society in Venezuela and the forthcoming Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know .
Your response to the death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez?
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Good morning.
I think it&#8217;s a tremendous loss for Venezuela and a loss for Latin America and as an advocate for South-South relationships. Just recall where Venezuela was in 1998. It had no real presence on the international stage. He had this oil-producing country that had 60 percent people living in poverty. Today, that has dramatically changed. Poverty has been reduced significantly within Venezuela, and you have a new sense, a new empowerment, a new feeling and a new sentiment, not only within Venezuela but within Latin America as a whole, and as an advocate of South-South relationships. And I think that, even in death, he will continue to be an important symbol for the very policies he advocated in life and for the integration of Latin America and its new role on the international stage.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And I&#8217;d like to also welcome Eva Golinger. She has been well known as an American lawyer who has worked with the Venezuelan government and was close to President Chávez. Your reaction on this day after his death?
EVA GOLINGER : Well, it&#8217;s incredibly sad, of course. It&#8217;s a tremendous tragedy for Venezuela, for people of Venezuela, for people of Latin America, I would say also for people around the world who fight for social justice. Chávez was a champion for the poor, for social justice, against imperialism, against aggression, against war. He&#8217;s someone who has left an extraordinary legacy, not just in his own country, I think, but around the world. It&#8217;s an unbelievable tragedy that someone so young, with so much energy, with so much charisma, and with so much determination to continue building his great country and this concept of la Patria Grande , the Great Homeland, in Latin America, would leave us so soon. So I think that Venezuelans and peoples around the world are going to mourn seriously his loss.
AMY GOODMAN : From two Venezuelan Americans, we go to Greg Grandin, also in our New York studio, currently a Cullman fellow at the New York Public Library, author of Empire&#8217;s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism . His most recent book, Fordlandia , was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History. His new book is called Empire of Necessity . It will be published later this year. Greg Grandin, talk about who Hugo Chávez was. Give us a little, short history of his life.
GREG GRANDIN : Well, in many ways, if you look at how his life tracks the history of Latin America, it&#8217;s quite amazing. He was born a few days after the 1954 coup in Guatemala that drove Jacobo Árbenz from power. And that coup, in many ways, culminated the subordination of Latin America to the United States in the Cold War.
AMY GOODMAN : Because the U.S. was involved.
GREG GRANDIN : The U.S. led that coup, yeah. And that happened in a few days. And his life pretty much ran the whole trajectory, from that moment forward, of U.S. power in Latin America. It saw the rise and extension of U.S.-backed militarism throughout the region, Venezuela a little bit less than some of the other more homicidal anti-communist countries, but nonetheless Venezuela was closely allied to the United States during the Cold War. He came of age under a political regime that was often held up as a little United States, in which two ideologically indistinguishable parties traded power back and forth between 1958, &#8217;59 up through the 1990s.
And then he died, and Latin America has largely led this remarkable movement for independence that he was—that he helped broker. When he came to power in—elected in 1998, when you think about it, the whole region was governed by neoliberals or, you know, pretty much allies and executors of the Washington Consensus neoliberalism. And he was the first person that began to challenge that in power. Lula in Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was elected in 2002; Néstor Kirchner in 2002; Evo Morales a few years later; Rafael Correa in Ecuador. But it really was, in some ways, Chávez that led that remarkable, incredible movement that&#8217;s world historical. It&#8217;s unprecedented.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And one point I made in my column in the Daily News today on Chávez is that, to the degree that he was seen by the United States and Europe as the most radical of Latin American leaders, he created space for an enormous diversity of other left-oriented leaders that seemed almost more acceptable to the West up against the figure, the lightning-rod figure, of Chávez.
GREG GRANDIN : Yeah, for a long time, Washington policymakers and opinion makers were trying to create this idea that there were two lefts—a good left and a bad left—in Latin America, vegetarian left and a carnivore left. And the kind of emblematic leaders of that was Lula in Brazil, a reformist, you know, administered within the institutions of law, and Chávez. You know, fiery populist is a word—a description that I&#8217;m sure has been used kind of like Mad Libs, you know, in obituaries of Chávez. But in reality, they actually worked together very nicely. I mean, if you read the WikiLeaks cables, it was no—the U.S. was constantly trying to push this notion of a division or a divide between Brazil and Venezuela, and Brazil constantly rebuffed it. And certainly, Chávez&#8217;s more flamboyant style on the world stage created a much more willingness to work with so-called more moderate reformers like Lula. And I would argue that their differences had more to do with the political structures that they inherited than anything. And I think they both, in very real ways, had exactly the same goal.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to go to break and continue this roundtable discussion and also bring you clips of our exclusive discussions with President Hugo Chávez, as well as the vice president, Nicolás Maduro, who will run for president in this next 30 days. And the question is: Where will Venezuela go? This is Democracy Now! We&#8217;ll be back in a minute.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : You can go to our website to see an in-depth look at Democracy Now! &#8217;s coverage of Hugo Chávez over the years and related stories at democracynow.org, as we continue on this day after the death of the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez. Juan?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, I&#8217;d like to ask Gregory Wilpert, you have written extensively on the Venezuelan revolution, but especially you have focused on what most of the rest of the people in the United States and other parts of the world have not seen, which is the domestic impact of Chávez&#8217;s revolution on the everyday life of the Venezuelan people. I&#8217;m wondering if you could talk about that. For instance, you&#8217;ve written that the number of cooperatives in Venezuela escalated from about a thousand to 100,000 during the Chávez years. Could you speak about that?
GREGORY WILPERT : Yeah. I mean, Miguel Tinker Salas mentioned a couple of those changes, such as the decline in poverty, which is very important. I mean, there are certain things that people always focus on, and certainly the poverty one is very important, which declined by half during the—during Chávez&#8217;s presidency. Also, extreme poverty declined by more than two-thirds.
But in addition to these kind of standard-of-living improvements that happened for Venezuela&#8217;s poor majority, there were also these elements of participatory democracy that had been introduced with Chávez&#8217;s election. One of the most important, I think, is actually the introduction of communal councils in Venezuela. Over 30,000 communal councils were introduced, which are basically direct participatory, direct democratic structures throughout the country where people work on neighborhood improvement projects, and they really feel like they have a stake and acquire an ownership of their community. This is just one example. And, of course, the cooperatives and self-managed workplaces are others.
I mean, Chávez was really trying to introduce socialism and putting it on the map, really, back again on the map for the 21st century. And it wasn&#8217;t just an economic socialism, but also a political socialism, by which he meant a participatory democracy, which is what he was trying to create.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And that&#8217;s an image quite different from what we receive here of an authoritarian leader.
GREGORY WILPERT : Yes, absolutely. I mean, certainly Chávez had his top-down management style, which certainly clashed and bothered many people. But on the other hand, one cannot deny, I think, that participation in Venezuela increased, from any measure that you look at, whether it&#8217;s the Latinobarómetro polls, which show that Venezuelans believe that their democracy is more democratic than it had ever been and in comparison to what other people say of other countries in Latin America, and also that they&#8217;ve—they&#8217;re participating much more in elections. I mean, participation and registration have increased dramatically. Voting centers and polling stations throughout the country have been distributed to poor neighborhoods where people used to have to wait a whole day in order to vote. Now it&#8217;s reduced tremendously, and it&#8217;s much faster. So there&#8217;s—just in every measure, like I said, there&#8217;s more participation in the democratic process.
AMY GOODMAN : Tens of thousands celebrated in the streets of the capital Caracas after the results of the 2012 election were announced. Chávez held a replica of the sword of independence hero Simón Bolívar during the victory celebration at a rally outside the presidential palace. Chávez reached out to the political opposition and called for unity among Venezuelans.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] To those who promote hate, to those who promote social poison, to those who are always trying to deny all the good things that happen in Venezuela, I invite them to dialogue, to debate and to work together for Venezuela, for the Bolivarian people, for the Bolivarian Venezuela. That&#8217;s why I start by sending these greetings to them and extending these two hands and heart to them in the name of all of us, because we are brothers in the fatherland of Bolívar.
AMY GOODMAN : That was Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez last year after his election. We&#8217;re also joined by Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington-based policy forum on Western Hemisphere affairs, adjunct professor of Latin American politics at Georgetown University&#8217;s School of Foreign Service. Your assessment of President Chávez&#8217;s legacy and what he represented?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, I think he did—Chávez really put his finger on legitimate grievance of social injustice and social inequality in Venezuela and throughout much of Latin America. He deserves a lot of credit for that, and I think that was his great contribution.
The problem is, I don&#8217;t think he really constructed an alternative after 14 years, and I think mainly because his style, his approach, was that he made all the decisions. He concentrated power in his own hands. And that&#8217;s very, very difficult to construct an effective system, a governance model, when only one person makes all the decisions. So, my sense is that he had a great opportunity because he had tremendous charisma, connected with the Venezuelan people, cared about the Venezuelan people, and the Venezuelans felt that. And he had a lot of resources. Oil prices went up substantially from the time he came in in 1999 &#39;til now. He really had an opportunity to reshape in a significant way and put the country on a sustainable path of development. I&#39;m not sure that if one looks at Venezuela today that it&#8217;s on that path.
And I think you have enormous problems that are there. There are shortages of basic goods. There is the highest inflation rate in Latin America. Crime is off the charts. If you look at the crime rate when he came in versus the crime rate today, there&#8217;s tremendous insecurity. Caracas is one of the most crime-ridden cities in the world today. So, this is not a government that I think has been very competent and very effective. And I think it&#8217;s a product of the fact that he is somebody who believed that he represents the general will of Venezuelan people. He is a legitimate president, there&#8217;s no question about that, but you also need to, I think, bring in other sectors of the society, and he was a very polarizing figure. So I think he deserves credit. I think his legacy is a mixed one. But I think, in the end, this will be seen as a great opportunity for Venezuela that was squandered in the end.
AMY GOODMAN : Eva Golinger, your response?
EVA GOLINGER : Well, I think that at least Michael Shifter recognized Chávez&#8217;s legacy in terms of changing the lives of Venezuelans, and particularly the poor, but I strongly disagree with the assessment of the fact that he didn&#8217;t build, one, a sustainable model, two, an alternative, viable alternative, for the country and for the region, because, before as Greg was saying, Chávez opened the door, opened a pathway, began that pathway and took that road to transforming Latin America forever. I mean, Venezuela has been transformed forever.
Talking about the level of participation, today in Venezuela more Venezuelans participate than ever before in history. Everyone has a voice. Everyone wants to be active and involved. Before Chávez came into power—and I lived there during that time—it was a country full of apathy, full of apathy, full of exclusion, people who didn&#8217;t even care about participating because their participation meant nothing. That&#8217;s changed 100 percent and will never reverse its course.
At the same time, much has been focused on Chávez the man, Chávez Chávez, because he was an all-encompassing figure, he was larger than life. You know, he had this enormous personality and tremendous charisma. But at the same time, the vision that he had and that he began to implement collectively along with the people of Venezuela was about power to the people. And I think there&#8217;s no question that that has taken root in the country today. And we&#8217;ve seen it: Even after Chávez was elected in October and then was diagnosed again that the cancer had returned, and he was unable to participate in elections that followed after that for governors, for regional elections, nonetheless—he didn&#8217;t appear in one campaign event—his party won in 20 out of 23 states in the country. I mean, it was a clear showing of the leadership that was growing within the ranks of his party. At the same time, we&#8217;ve seen, you know, people are pouring into the streets of Venezuela, and have been throughout this time period, saying, &quot;I am Chávez.&quot; And that doesn&#8217;t just mean, you know, &quot;I love Chávez.&quot; It means &quot;Chávez represented me, represented my family, my community, my interests.&quot;
And I think that today what we&#8217;re seeing in Venezuela, through these communal councils, through all this popular participation, is a collective leadership that has grown. And I think that in the end, that was Chávez&#8217;s overall objective, how to transfer that power into the hands of the people, empower the people so that they feel they have the capacity to govern their nation. And I think that that has unquestionably happened in Venezuela, and that&#8217;s one of the strongest elements of Chávez&#8217;s legacy.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, Greg Wilpert, what about these issues that Michael Shifter raises of the increasing crime rate in Venezuela—I&#8217;m not sure that Caracas is yet at the level of the place of my birth, Puerto Rico, in terms of crime rates, but it certainly has escalated dramatically—and the inflation situation and the unsustainability of the economic model that Chávez has developed?
GREGORY WILPERT : Well, I mean, I obviously disagree, as well, that I think it&#8217;s definitely sustainable. Venezuela, for example—I mean, people keep mentioning the inflation. True, it&#8217;s very high, but it&#8217;s lower than it was in the pre-Chávez years. It averaged 50 percent per year in the two presidents before Chávez. And he brought it—Chávez brought it down to around 20 percent in these last couple years. The average, I think, is around 22 percent per year. So that&#8217;s a decent achievement for an oil-producing country that basically earns its foreign currency in oil and funnels it back into the social programs, into the economy. And that, of course, generates inflation. But as long as incomes rise faster than inflation, it&#8217;s not really that big a deal. I mean, it&#8217;s a hassle, it&#8217;s a problem, but it&#8217;s not unsustainable.
The other thing is, I think that certainly crime is an issue, and it is a serious problem. I think it was basically based on a miscalculation on the part of the government. They believed that once you get poverty down, crime would go down by itself. And they didn&#8217;t do enough to actually make sure that there&#8217;s enough police, a decently functioning judicial system. And that&#8217;s really one of the big areas where a lot more needs to be done. But other than that, really, I think that, like I said, economically and socially, there&#8217;s been tremendous achievements in the last couple of years.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, I&#8217;d like to ask you about the issue of oil and the importance of oil in Venezuela to the Chávez revolution. But first, I&#8217;d like to play a clip of an interview that we did back in 2005 when President Chávez was here for the United Nations General Assembly, one of the first televised interviews that he did here in the United States, where he spoke to Democracy Now! about the role of oil in his country.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] So we&#8217;re now providing—first we&#8217;re ensuring the supply of oil, direct supply of oil from state to state, in order to avoid the speculation of multinationals and traders. They buy gasoline in Venezuela, and then they go to a Caribbean country and they charge double. So we are selling the products to the states directly. We are not charging for freight. We assume the cost of freight. But apart from that, this discount is not of 25 percent. It goes to 40 percent of the total. And this money will be paid back in 25 years&#8217; time, with two years of grace and 1 percent interest rates. So, if you make all of the mathematical calculations, the donation percentage is almost 70 percent, because it&#8217;s a long-term adjusted 1 percent. So what Venezuela&#8217;s doing is supplying 200,000 barrels of oil to the Caribbean and other Central American and South American countries, such as Paraguay, Uruguay and smaller nations in South America—200,000 millions of barrels. If you apply calculations, mathematical calculations, by 1.5 percent of our GDP—1.5 percent of the GDP is devoted to this cooperation—it means that we are financing these sister nations that next year will reach $1.7 billion a year. In 10 years, it&#8217;s $17 billion. It&#8217;s a way for us to share, to share our resources with these countries.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was President Hugo Chávez in September of 2005 in an interview, exclusive interview, with Democracy Now! that he held with Amy and myself. I wanted to ask you, Miguel Tinker Salas, the impact of the oil policies of President Chávez on the independence of the Latin American region and the ability to export the idea of a social revolution throughout Latin America?
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Yeah, I think oil has to be understood as something that is not simply an economic question for Venezuela. It&#8217;s also a very important political, symbolic and cultural element within Venezuelan society. For Venezuelans, it was supposed to be the vehicle to modernization. And when Chávez comes to power in 1998, oil prices were less than $7 a barrel. So, in many ways, what the government had to do was to reconstruct a vision of Venezuela that included oil as part of the motor of change, of social change in Venezuela, not only for Venezuela, but also for the region. And oil was its most important cachet.
So, the first stage we saw was an effort to reclaim the oil industry, which began to operate essentially as an international conglomerate that was housed in Venezuela but did not really consider itself Venezuelan. So that was the first stage we saw in the context of reclaiming oil and attempting to create oil within a sustainable bandwidth in which Venezuela could sell oil commercially and then also initiate social programs and then also be able to provide it, as it did in the San José Accords in the 1970s, along with Mexico, to Central American countries, to Caribbean countries, that had to pay very onerous prices. So what Chávez&#8217;s government does is to use oil not simply to buttress relations with the U.S., but to buttress relations with Latin America in a very important way, to provide oil and long-term credits to countries like Nicaragua, like Dominican Republic, like Jamaica and other countries in the region, and including Cuba, and using that to create a tremendous amount of political goodwill, because it recognized that Venezuela has an important role, not simply as a purveyor of energy to the First World, to the U.S., which was its dominant trading partner, but really to Latin America.
And then that notion of economic nationalism, of economic sovereignty, spread throughout Latin America. We saw the same example in Bolivia nationalizing the gas industry. We saw Ecuador rejoining OPEC . We saw the creation of Petrocaribe, a Caribbean initiative that provided oil at short-term—long-term credit rates to the Caribbean. We saw the provision of oil to—of heating oil to communities in the U.S. under the banner of Citgo, so that Northeastern communities that had to pay onerous prices received oils at subsidized prices, as well. And we saw also Petrosur, the creation of a South American oil body that actually helped negotiate conditions for oil industry.
So, in many ways, many of that is attributable to the policies that the Chávez government instituted. And I think that&#8217;s what was sustainable. I think the previous system that had existed before 1998 was unsustainable. And the reality is that with that kind of recasting of oil, and of its symbolic importance as a part of the integral development of social development of Venezuela, we saw that clash between the imaginary Venezuela that saw itself simply as an international oil-producing country, and now reclaiming the oil industry as part and parcel of the social development within Venezuela, a major chasm had developed. And I think that&#8217;s what was healed under the Chávez administration.
AMY GOODMAN : Miguel Tinker Salas; and Gregory Wilpert of Venezuelanalysis; Eva Golinger, Venezuelan-American attorney, close friend of President Chávez; Greg Grandin of New York University, New York Public Library; and Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue, we&#8217;re going to break and then come back to this discussion—also ask the question: How is it that President Chávez managed to survive a coup against him, that other leaders, from Aristide to Salvador Allende, to President Zelaya of Honduras, did not manage to survive? Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : On this day after the death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, we&#8217;re going to talk right now about how it is that he survived an attempted coup when other Latin American and Caribbean leaders could not. I want to turn to an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the 2002 coup. The film is called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised . The excerpt begins with then-White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer.
PRESS SECRETARY ARI FLEISCHER : Let me share with you the administration&#8217;s thoughts about what&#8217;s taking place in Venezuela. We know that the action encouraged by the Chávez government provoked this crisis. The Chávez government suppressed peaceful demonstrations, fired on unarmed peaceful protesters, resulting in 10 killed and 100 wounded. That is what took place. And a transitional civilian government has been installed.
NARRATOR : Despite the blackout by the Venezuelan private media, members of Chávez&#8217;s government had managed to communicate with international television networks, getting the message back to Venezuela via cable TV that Chávez had not resigned and was being held captive.
The palace guard, who had remained loyal to Chávez decided to act. Behind Carmona&#8217;s back, a plot was being hatched by Chávez&#8217;s men to retake the palace. The plan was for the guard to take up key positions, surround the palace and to wait for a given signal.
With all their positions secured, the signal was given, and the presidential guard moved in. Several members of the newly installed government were taken prisoner, but in the confusion, Carmona and the generals had managed to slip away.
As the guards secured the building, Chávez&#8217;s ministers, who had been in hiding for the last two days, began to arrive back to the palace to try and reestablish the legitimate Cabinet.
AMY GOODMAN : That&#8217;s a clip from the documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised . Michael Shifter in Washington, D.C., of the Inter-American Dialogue, how is it that President Chávez managed to survive this coup and retain power, when so many, from President Aristide of Haiti to Honduras&#8217;s Zelaya, to, well, famously, of course, President Allende in Chile, did not survive their coups?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, there&#8217;s a lot of—
AMY GOODMAN : The coups against them, I should say, that the U.S. was involved with.
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Sure. There&#8217;s a lot of history of failed coups in Latin America. And there are other cases, as well. President Chávez himself attempted a coup in 1992 in Venezuela that failed. And this one failed, as well. Fortunately, I think, it failed. And, you know, there are a lot of cases where there&#8217;s an attempted overthrow of a democratically elected legitimate government, like Chávez in April of 2002. And obviously, he had a lot of support. Obviously this was, you know, terribly done. And I&#8217;m glad that it failed. I think that the statement from the White House was terrible and shameful and disgraceful.
But I think that this is—you know, this is why he didn&#8217;t follow the—you know, of Allende and others, I think that the circumstances were just very, very different. I don&#8217;t think you can compare this and put this in the same category. The time was different. The circumstances were different. The role of the United States was different. And again, I think that if one looks at a variety of countries, one can see other cases and examples of coups that didn&#8217;t succeed. And I&#8217;m happy when they don&#8217;t succeed, because I think when you have a legitimate government that&#8217;s elected by the people and you have an interruption in democracy, that that is a very serious, troubling development.
AMY GOODMAN : Juan, there&#8217;s an old Latin—
MICHAEL SHIFTER : So I&#8217;m glad it didn&#8217;t succeed in April 2002.
AMY GOODMAN : There&#8217;s an old Latin American—
MICHAEL SHIFTER : And I&#8217;m glad Chávez&#8217;s didn&#8217;t, either.
AMY GOODMAN : There&#8217;s an old Latin American joke that says, &quot;Why hasn&#8217;t the U.S. ever undergone a coup?&quot; And that&#8217;s because there&#8217;s no U.S. embassy here.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, I&#8217;d like to ask Michael Shifter, your sense of where—what the future now holds in terms of Venezuela, the ability of the opposition to mount a strong campaign against Nicolás Maduro, because obviously Maduro is going to be the candidate of the Chávez forces? What do you look for now in the coming days in terms of indications of where the situation in Venezuela will go?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, I think there are going to be elections. I think Maduro is going to be the candidate. I think he has—the chances are that he&#8217;s going to be elected. All the polls show that. The opposition is very, very demoralized, very fragmented. They lost in October by 11 points. They lost the governorships in December. They&#8217;re looking for a strategy. They&#8217;re wondering about their leadership. So I think the government certainly has the upper hand, and I think that the government will come together. There are different factions within Chavismo, but I think they&#8217;ll come together, certainly in the short term. So I look, for the short term, for things to be fairly stable and fairly steady under the leadership of Nicolás Maduro. I think that&#8217;s probably the likely scenario.
What I&#8217;m going to look for is more in the next six to eight months when, if the economic situation continues to deteriorate, and you might want to look for some strains and infighting within the Chávez camp. Nobody can match Chávez&#8217;s charisma and his ability to hold together the different forces within Chavismo. He had that unique ability. Maduro, for all of his whatever skills he has, he doesn&#8217;t have that talent. And I think that we could see developing some real tensions within the Chávez camp that could really—has the potential, at least, to create some turmoil.
But for the short term, my guess is that things will—that Maduro will be the president. The opposition has a long way to go to regroup and come up with an alternative strategy. Hopefully they&#8217;ll work on that and do that. But they just suffered two defeats, and they are figuring out what to do.
AMY GOODMAN : Nicolás Maduro, of course, now is the Venezuelan vice president. In October 2007, when he was Venezuela&#8217;s foreign minister, we had a chance to interview him. It was a year after President Chávez had famously referred to then-President George W. Bush as the devil in a speech before the General Assembly. Before we hear from Maduro, let&#8217;s go to that clip of Chávez at the U.N. in 2006.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] And the devil came here yesterday. Yesterday, the devil came here, right here, right here. And it smells of sulfur still today.
AMY GOODMAN : That was Hugo Chávez, Venezuela&#8217;s president, speaking at the U.N. in 2006, referring to George W. Bush. Well, the next year, in 2007, I asked Nicolás Maduro what message he had for the United States.
NICOLÁS MADURO : [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what&#8217;s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.
Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it&#8217;s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That&#8217;s the main message, and that&#8217;s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Vice President Nicolás Maduro, then foreign minister of Venezuela, talking with Democracy Now! I wanted to ask you, Eva, you know Nicolás Maduro well. Could you tell us who is he, his origins and development as part of the Chávez movement? And there are some who say that he&#8217;s actually more politically to the left than Chávez was in terms of his perspectives and his analysis.
EVA GOLINGER : Yeah, well, I think also the previous response, when talking about the coup and why it didn&#8217;t function in Venezuela, even though it did for a 48-hour period—and that needs to be remembered—and talking about, you know, what will happen from now on, showed the sort of position that you see out of a lot of analysts in the United States and around the world that underestimates entirely the Venezuelan people and their capacity, the capacity of President Chávez, as well as others, like Nicolás Maduro.
Nicolás comes from working-class roots. He was a bus driver. He was a union organizer. He&#8217;s someone who, you know, was a part of grassroots movements. And he became a part of Chávez&#8217;s movement when Chávez led a military rebellion in 1992 to try to oust a murderous and corrupt president at the time, that most of Venezuelans actually supported that rebellion, which did fail. And that&#8217;s when Chávez came on the scene, took responsibility for that publicly. He actually went to prison. While he was in prison, Nicolás joined in his movement. And the movement that Chávez had built had originally been out of the military. Chávez was a soldier. He was a lieutenant colonel in the armed forces, in the army.
AMY GOODMAN : And, as Shifter said, attempted a coup first, before he did become—
EVA GOLINGER : Attempted a military rebellion to overthrow the then-President Carlos Andrés Pérez, who had, in two-and-a-half years before, ordered the state security forces to massacre the people of Venezuela when they protested his implementing neoliberal reforms in the country, privatization. More than 3,000 Venezuelans were killed. Mass grave sites were dug. And, you know, no one really knows the numbers that were killed by the government of that time. So a lot of people supported what Chávez was trying to do. Nobody knew him at the time. I mean, that&#8217;s when he became known. And that&#8217;s when Nicolás Maduro also began to know him.
And so, Chávez began to build, together with this group of grassroots organizers, a movement based on civil-military unity. And that was one of the key factors, actually, that defeated the coup in April 2002 against Chávez, was the fact that the military and the people came together, that people in Venezuela, who had begun a transformation of the country—because a lot of times also what happens in Venezuela is underestimated. It&#8217;s seen as, you know, this government came into power, Chávez was elected, and he began to do all these radical reforms. But it&#8217;s actually—we call it a revolution because that&#8217;s what it is. It&#8217;s a systematic transformation of every sector of society. And, you know, that was beginning to take root in 2002 when the coup happened.
And so, that movement of people that Nicolás Maduro was a part of, he was then a member of parliament. He later became the head of parliament, of Venezuela&#8217;s National Assembly, president of the assembly. Chávez named him foreign minister in 2006, and he continued in that movement in that position. He was ridiculed nonstop by Venezuelan media, internationally, by the opposition, saying, you know, &quot;Oh, he&#8217;s a bus driver. You know, he knows nothing. He has no education. How could he be the top diplomat of the country?&quot; But he became, I think, one of Venezuela&#8217;s best foreign ministers that they&#8217;ve ever had. I mean, he has led all kinds of treaties and agreements that Venezuela has entered into with countries throughout the world that have benefited Venezuela substantially. You know, most of Venezuelan foreign policy is now based on integration, cooperation and mutual benefit, transfer of technology. I mean, no longer it&#8217;s about just what can we get from the other guy.
And so, Nicolás has then become the most intimate adviser of the president, by his side, especially throughout this very difficult period. He was the one who was always with Chávez while he was undergoing his treatments in Cuba, and he was the one that clearly came through as the person with the most capacity to unify Chavismo and to carry on those policies. And I would definitely say that he certainly maintains a very radical and profound leftist position and wholeheartedly will carry on the movement led by Chávez.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Gregory Wilpert, I wanted to ask you about the role of the Venezuelan media, both in opposition to Chávez all this time, especially its role in Venezuelan society, because he&#8217;s often been criticized as attempting to muzzle the media.
GREGORY WILPERT : Right. Well, you know, that&#8217;s one of the things that constantly critics point out to, is that the media is somehow being repressed in Venezuela. But if you turn on the TV or look at the newspapers, you see constant diatribes and constant criticisms and raising of problems that exist in Venezuela. And so, I mean, it&#8217;s very difficult to reconcile that with this claim that there&#8217;s some kind of repression against the private media.
The other thing is, people say that Chávez created all these other media outlets that are completely swamping their airwaves, but that&#8217;s not true. It&#8217;s true that there are many new media outlets, but they only actually get a very small percentage of the viewership. And so, the private media actually still predominates in Venezuela, despite what—the impression that people get from what&#8217;s going on. And so—but there&#8217;s a much greater diversity of opinions and of freedom of speech, really, because you also have tons of community media. So there&#8217;s an incredible amount of debate going on in Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to continue this discussion. There will be a seven-day period of mourning. President Hugo Chávez will be buried on Friday. That&#8217;s when his funeral will be. That does it for our show, and I want to thank all of our guests: Gregory Wilpert, founder of Venezuelanalysis.com ; Eva Golinger, friend and adviser to President Hugo Chávez, author of The Chávez Code ; Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California; Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington; and Greg Grandin, currently Cullman fellow at the New York Public Library. You can go to our website at democracynow.org for complete coverage of Hugo Chávez with our exclusive interviews of both Chávez and Maduro. That&#8217;s democracynow.org. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Venezuela has announced seven days of mourning for its president, Hugo Chávez, who has died at the age of 58. Chávez died after a two-year battle with cancer that was first detected in his pelvis in June of 2011. He had suffered multiple complications following his latest operation in Cuba on December 11th and had not been seen in public since then. News of Chávez’s death was delivered Tuesday in an emotional address by Vice President Nicolás Maduro.

VICEPRESIDENT NICOLÁS MADURO: [translated] We accompanied his daughters, his brother, his family members, and we received the hardest and the most tragic of news that we will ever transmit to our people: At 4:25 in the afternoon today, the 5th of March, Comandante President Hugo Chávez Frías died.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Hugo Chávez’s body will be taken in a procession to the Military Academy in Caracas, where it will lie in state until his funeral on Friday. Venezuela’s schools and universities have been shut for the week. Vice President Maduro will assume the presidency until an election is called within 30 days. Foreign Minister Elías Jaua told state television that Maduro would also be the candidate of Chávez’s governing United Socialist Party.

FOREIGNMINISTER ELÍAS JAUA: [translated] The president read the constitution correctly on December 8th during his last public speech that he was able to give, and it is clearly established what will follow and what we always defended. He is gone now, and the vice president assumes power, and we hold elections in the next 30 days. That’s the mandate that Hugo Chávez issued last December 8th, and he asked all of his Bolivarian revolutionaries to accompany Nicolás Maduro in this task. And that is what we are going to do.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Meanwhile, Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles, who was defeated by Chávez last October, offered his condolences to the president’s family and called for unity as the nation mourns.

HENRIQUECAPRILES: [translated] To the government, who are burdened with the principal responsibility of guaranteeing coexistence in freedom and in peace, we hope, like all Venezuelans do, that they act in strict accordance with their constitutional duties. And our national armed forces should remain for all, because they belong to everyone, as it is in the constitution and its proud history.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Leaders from around the world sent their condolences to the Chávez family. Some allies, like Ecuador, called for national days of mourning in their own country. This is Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and Peruvian President Ollanta Humala, but first this is Bolivian President Evo Morales remembering Chávez.

PRESIDENTEVOMORALES: [translated] He fought for his country, for the great nation, like Simón Bolívar, a friend who gave his entire life for the liberation of the Venezuelan people, the people of Latin America and all anti-imperialists and anti-capitalists of the world.

PRESIDENTDILMAROUSSEFF: [translated] On many occasions, the Brazilian government did not completely agree with President Hugo Chávez. But today, as always, we must recognize that he was a great leader, an irreparable loss, and above all, a friend of Brazil, a friend of the Brazilian people.

PRESIDENTOLLANTAHUMALA: [translated] To the Venezuelan people, we wish to express our unity of reflection and our hope that things can progress in a passive manner with the cause of democracy in mind. We want to express our solidarity with the Venezuelan people, with the family of our friend, President Hugo Chávez Frías.

AMYGOODMAN: The presidents of Peru, Bolivia and Brazil.

Here in the United States, President Obama called Chávez’s passing a "challenging time" for Venezuela. This comes as Vice President Maduro of Venezuela announced Tuesday he is expelling a U.S. embassy military attaché, accusing him of spying on the Venezuelan military and meeting with right-wing military officers in a plan to destabilize Venezuela. Maduro also said a "scientific commission" would look into Chávez’s death and the possibility his "historical enemies" had somehow induced his cancer.

Well, today we host a roundtable to look at the life of Hugo Chávez, his legacy and what may come next for Venezuela. We’ll begin in California, where we’re joined by Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College of Claremont, California, author of The Enduring Legacy: Oil, Culture, and Society in Venezuela and the forthcoming Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know.

Your response to the death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez?

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Good morning.

I think it’s a tremendous loss for Venezuela and a loss for Latin America and as an advocate for South-South relationships. Just recall where Venezuela was in 1998. It had no real presence on the international stage. He had this oil-producing country that had 60 percent people living in poverty. Today, that has dramatically changed. Poverty has been reduced significantly within Venezuela, and you have a new sense, a new empowerment, a new feeling and a new sentiment, not only within Venezuela but within Latin America as a whole, and as an advocate of South-South relationships. And I think that, even in death, he will continue to be an important symbol for the very policies he advocated in life and for the integration of Latin America and its new role on the international stage.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And I’d like to also welcome Eva Golinger. She has been well known as an American lawyer who has worked with the Venezuelan government and was close to President Chávez. Your reaction on this day after his death?

EVAGOLINGER: Well, it’s incredibly sad, of course. It’s a tremendous tragedy for Venezuela, for people of Venezuela, for people of Latin America, I would say also for people around the world who fight for social justice. Chávez was a champion for the poor, for social justice, against imperialism, against aggression, against war. He’s someone who has left an extraordinary legacy, not just in his own country, I think, but around the world. It’s an unbelievable tragedy that someone so young, with so much energy, with so much charisma, and with so much determination to continue building his great country and this concept of la Patria Grande, the Great Homeland, in Latin America, would leave us so soon. So I think that Venezuelans and peoples around the world are going to mourn seriously his loss.

AMYGOODMAN: From two Venezuelan Americans, we go to Greg Grandin, also in our New York studio, currently a Cullman fellow at the New York Public Library, author of Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism. His most recent book, Fordlandia, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History. His new book is called Empire of Necessity. It will be published later this year. Greg Grandin, talk about who Hugo Chávez was. Give us a little, short history of his life.

GREGGRANDIN: Well, in many ways, if you look at how his life tracks the history of Latin America, it’s quite amazing. He was born a few days after the 1954 coup in Guatemala that drove Jacobo Árbenz from power. And that coup, in many ways, culminated the subordination of Latin America to the United States in the Cold War.

AMYGOODMAN: Because the U.S. was involved.

GREGGRANDIN: The U.S. led that coup, yeah. And that happened in a few days. And his life pretty much ran the whole trajectory, from that moment forward, of U.S. power in Latin America. It saw the rise and extension of U.S.-backed militarism throughout the region, Venezuela a little bit less than some of the other more homicidal anti-communist countries, but nonetheless Venezuela was closely allied to the United States during the Cold War. He came of age under a political regime that was often held up as a little United States, in which two ideologically indistinguishable parties traded power back and forth between 1958, ’59 up through the 1990s.

And then he died, and Latin America has largely led this remarkable movement for independence that he was—that he helped broker. When he came to power in—elected in 1998, when you think about it, the whole region was governed by neoliberals or, you know, pretty much allies and executors of the Washington Consensus neoliberalism. And he was the first person that began to challenge that in power. Lula in Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was elected in 2002; Néstor Kirchner in 2002; Evo Morales a few years later; Rafael Correa in Ecuador. But it really was, in some ways, Chávez that led that remarkable, incredible movement that’s world historical. It’s unprecedented.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And one point I made in my column in the Daily News today on Chávez is that, to the degree that he was seen by the United States and Europe as the most radical of Latin American leaders, he created space for an enormous diversity of other left-oriented leaders that seemed almost more acceptable to the West up against the figure, the lightning-rod figure, of Chávez.

GREGGRANDIN: Yeah, for a long time, Washington policymakers and opinion makers were trying to create this idea that there were two lefts—a good left and a bad left—in Latin America, vegetarian left and a carnivore left. And the kind of emblematic leaders of that was Lula in Brazil, a reformist, you know, administered within the institutions of law, and Chávez. You know, fiery populist is a word—a description that I’m sure has been used kind of like Mad Libs, you know, in obituaries of Chávez. But in reality, they actually worked together very nicely. I mean, if you read the WikiLeaks cables, it was no—the U.S. was constantly trying to push this notion of a division or a divide between Brazil and Venezuela, and Brazil constantly rebuffed it. And certainly, Chávez’s more flamboyant style on the world stage created a much more willingness to work with so-called more moderate reformers like Lula. And I would argue that their differences had more to do with the political structures that they inherited than anything. And I think they both, in very real ways, had exactly the same goal.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to go to break and continue this roundtable discussion and also bring you clips of our exclusive discussions with President Hugo Chávez, as well as the vice president, Nicolás Maduro, who will run for president in this next 30 days. And the question is: Where will Venezuela go? This is Democracy Now! We’ll be back in a minute.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, I’d like to ask Gregory Wilpert, you have written extensively on the Venezuelan revolution, but especially you have focused on what most of the rest of the people in the United States and other parts of the world have not seen, which is the domestic impact of Chávez’s revolution on the everyday life of the Venezuelan people. I’m wondering if you could talk about that. For instance, you’ve written that the number of cooperatives in Venezuela escalated from about a thousand to 100,000 during the Chávez years. Could you speak about that?

GREGORYWILPERT: Yeah. I mean, Miguel Tinker Salas mentioned a couple of those changes, such as the decline in poverty, which is very important. I mean, there are certain things that people always focus on, and certainly the poverty one is very important, which declined by half during the—during Chávez’s presidency. Also, extreme poverty declined by more than two-thirds.

But in addition to these kind of standard-of-living improvements that happened for Venezuela’s poor majority, there were also these elements of participatory democracy that had been introduced with Chávez’s election. One of the most important, I think, is actually the introduction of communal councils in Venezuela. Over 30,000 communal councils were introduced, which are basically direct participatory, direct democratic structures throughout the country where people work on neighborhood improvement projects, and they really feel like they have a stake and acquire an ownership of their community. This is just one example. And, of course, the cooperatives and self-managed workplaces are others.

I mean, Chávez was really trying to introduce socialism and putting it on the map, really, back again on the map for the 21st century. And it wasn’t just an economic socialism, but also a political socialism, by which he meant a participatory democracy, which is what he was trying to create.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And that’s an image quite different from what we receive here of an authoritarian leader.

GREGORYWILPERT: Yes, absolutely. I mean, certainly Chávez had his top-down management style, which certainly clashed and bothered many people. But on the other hand, one cannot deny, I think, that participation in Venezuela increased, from any measure that you look at, whether it’s the Latinobarómetro polls, which show that Venezuelans believe that their democracy is more democratic than it had ever been and in comparison to what other people say of other countries in Latin America, and also that they’ve—they’re participating much more in elections. I mean, participation and registration have increased dramatically. Voting centers and polling stations throughout the country have been distributed to poor neighborhoods where people used to have to wait a whole day in order to vote. Now it’s reduced tremendously, and it’s much faster. So there’s—just in every measure, like I said, there’s more participation in the democratic process.

AMYGOODMAN: Tens of thousands celebrated in the streets of the capital Caracas after the results of the 2012 election were announced. Chávez held a replica of the sword of independence hero Simón Bolívar during the victory celebration at a rally outside the presidential palace. Chávez reached out to the political opposition and called for unity among Venezuelans.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] To those who promote hate, to those who promote social poison, to those who are always trying to deny all the good things that happen in Venezuela, I invite them to dialogue, to debate and to work together for Venezuela, for the Bolivarian people, for the Bolivarian Venezuela. That’s why I start by sending these greetings to them and extending these two hands and heart to them in the name of all of us, because we are brothers in the fatherland of Bolívar.

AMYGOODMAN: That was Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez last year after his election. We’re also joined by Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington-based policy forum on Western Hemisphere affairs, adjunct professor of Latin American politics at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. Your assessment of President Chávez’s legacy and what he represented?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, I think he did—Chávez really put his finger on legitimate grievance of social injustice and social inequality in Venezuela and throughout much of Latin America. He deserves a lot of credit for that, and I think that was his great contribution.

The problem is, I don’t think he really constructed an alternative after 14 years, and I think mainly because his style, his approach, was that he made all the decisions. He concentrated power in his own hands. And that’s very, very difficult to construct an effective system, a governance model, when only one person makes all the decisions. So, my sense is that he had a great opportunity because he had tremendous charisma, connected with the Venezuelan people, cared about the Venezuelan people, and the Venezuelans felt that. And he had a lot of resources. Oil prices went up substantially from the time he came in in 1999 'til now. He really had an opportunity to reshape in a significant way and put the country on a sustainable path of development. I'm not sure that if one looks at Venezuela today that it’s on that path.

And I think you have enormous problems that are there. There are shortages of basic goods. There is the highest inflation rate in Latin America. Crime is off the charts. If you look at the crime rate when he came in versus the crime rate today, there’s tremendous insecurity. Caracas is one of the most crime-ridden cities in the world today. So, this is not a government that I think has been very competent and very effective. And I think it’s a product of the fact that he is somebody who believed that he represents the general will of Venezuelan people. He is a legitimate president, there’s no question about that, but you also need to, I think, bring in other sectors of the society, and he was a very polarizing figure. So I think he deserves credit. I think his legacy is a mixed one. But I think, in the end, this will be seen as a great opportunity for Venezuela that was squandered in the end.

AMYGOODMAN: Eva Golinger, your response?

EVAGOLINGER: Well, I think that at least Michael Shifter recognized Chávez’s legacy in terms of changing the lives of Venezuelans, and particularly the poor, but I strongly disagree with the assessment of the fact that he didn’t build, one, a sustainable model, two, an alternative, viable alternative, for the country and for the region, because, before as Greg was saying, Chávez opened the door, opened a pathway, began that pathway and took that road to transforming Latin America forever. I mean, Venezuela has been transformed forever.

Talking about the level of participation, today in Venezuela more Venezuelans participate than ever before in history. Everyone has a voice. Everyone wants to be active and involved. Before Chávez came into power—and I lived there during that time—it was a country full of apathy, full of apathy, full of exclusion, people who didn’t even care about participating because their participation meant nothing. That’s changed 100 percent and will never reverse its course.

At the same time, much has been focused on Chávez the man, Chávez Chávez, because he was an all-encompassing figure, he was larger than life. You know, he had this enormous personality and tremendous charisma. But at the same time, the vision that he had and that he began to implement collectively along with the people of Venezuela was about power to the people. And I think there’s no question that that has taken root in the country today. And we’ve seen it: Even after Chávez was elected in October and then was diagnosed again that the cancer had returned, and he was unable to participate in elections that followed after that for governors, for regional elections, nonetheless—he didn’t appear in one campaign event—his party won in 20 out of 23 states in the country. I mean, it was a clear showing of the leadership that was growing within the ranks of his party. At the same time, we’ve seen, you know, people are pouring into the streets of Venezuela, and have been throughout this time period, saying, "I am Chávez." And that doesn’t just mean, you know, "I love Chávez." It means "Chávez represented me, represented my family, my community, my interests."

And I think that today what we’re seeing in Venezuela, through these communal councils, through all this popular participation, is a collective leadership that has grown. And I think that in the end, that was Chávez’s overall objective, how to transfer that power into the hands of the people, empower the people so that they feel they have the capacity to govern their nation. And I think that that has unquestionably happened in Venezuela, and that’s one of the strongest elements of Chávez’s legacy.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, Greg Wilpert, what about these issues that Michael Shifter raises of the increasing crime rate in Venezuela—I’m not sure that Caracas is yet at the level of the place of my birth, Puerto Rico, in terms of crime rates, but it certainly has escalated dramatically—and the inflation situation and the unsustainability of the economic model that Chávez has developed?

GREGORYWILPERT: Well, I mean, I obviously disagree, as well, that I think it’s definitely sustainable. Venezuela, for example—I mean, people keep mentioning the inflation. True, it’s very high, but it’s lower than it was in the pre-Chávez years. It averaged 50 percent per year in the two presidents before Chávez. And he brought it—Chávez brought it down to around 20 percent in these last couple years. The average, I think, is around 22 percent per year. So that’s a decent achievement for an oil-producing country that basically earns its foreign currency in oil and funnels it back into the social programs, into the economy. And that, of course, generates inflation. But as long as incomes rise faster than inflation, it’s not really that big a deal. I mean, it’s a hassle, it’s a problem, but it’s not unsustainable.

The other thing is, I think that certainly crime is an issue, and it is a serious problem. I think it was basically based on a miscalculation on the part of the government. They believed that once you get poverty down, crime would go down by itself. And they didn’t do enough to actually make sure that there’s enough police, a decently functioning judicial system. And that’s really one of the big areas where a lot more needs to be done. But other than that, really, I think that, like I said, economically and socially, there’s been tremendous achievements in the last couple of years.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, I’d like to ask you about the issue of oil and the importance of oil in Venezuela to the Chávez revolution. But first, I’d like to play a clip of an interview that we did back in 2005 when President Chávez was here for the United Nations General Assembly, one of the first televised interviews that he did here in the United States, where he spoke to Democracy Now! about the role of oil in his country.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] So we’re now providing—first we’re ensuring the supply of oil, direct supply of oil from state to state, in order to avoid the speculation of multinationals and traders. They buy gasoline in Venezuela, and then they go to a Caribbean country and they charge double. So we are selling the products to the states directly. We are not charging for freight. We assume the cost of freight. But apart from that, this discount is not of 25 percent. It goes to 40 percent of the total. And this money will be paid back in 25 years’ time, with two years of grace and 1 percent interest rates. So, if you make all of the mathematical calculations, the donation percentage is almost 70 percent, because it’s a long-term adjusted 1 percent. So what Venezuela’s doing is supplying 200,000 barrels of oil to the Caribbean and other Central American and South American countries, such as Paraguay, Uruguay and smaller nations in South America—200,000 millions of barrels. If you apply calculations, mathematical calculations, by 1.5 percent of our GDP—1.5 percent of the GDP is devoted to this cooperation—it means that we are financing these sister nations that next year will reach $1.7 billion a year. In 10 years, it’s $17 billion. It’s a way for us to share, to share our resources with these countries.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was President Hugo Chávez in September of 2005 in an interview, exclusive interview, with Democracy Now! that he held with Amy and myself. I wanted to ask you, Miguel Tinker Salas, the impact of the oil policies of President Chávez on the independence of the Latin American region and the ability to export the idea of a social revolution throughout Latin America?

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Yeah, I think oil has to be understood as something that is not simply an economic question for Venezuela. It’s also a very important political, symbolic and cultural element within Venezuelan society. For Venezuelans, it was supposed to be the vehicle to modernization. And when Chávez comes to power in 1998, oil prices were less than $7 a barrel. So, in many ways, what the government had to do was to reconstruct a vision of Venezuela that included oil as part of the motor of change, of social change in Venezuela, not only for Venezuela, but also for the region. And oil was its most important cachet.

So, the first stage we saw was an effort to reclaim the oil industry, which began to operate essentially as an international conglomerate that was housed in Venezuela but did not really consider itself Venezuelan. So that was the first stage we saw in the context of reclaiming oil and attempting to create oil within a sustainable bandwidth in which Venezuela could sell oil commercially and then also initiate social programs and then also be able to provide it, as it did in the San José Accords in the 1970s, along with Mexico, to Central American countries, to Caribbean countries, that had to pay very onerous prices. So what Chávez’s government does is to use oil not simply to buttress relations with the U.S., but to buttress relations with Latin America in a very important way, to provide oil and long-term credits to countries like Nicaragua, like Dominican Republic, like Jamaica and other countries in the region, and including Cuba, and using that to create a tremendous amount of political goodwill, because it recognized that Venezuela has an important role, not simply as a purveyor of energy to the First World, to the U.S., which was its dominant trading partner, but really to Latin America.

And then that notion of economic nationalism, of economic sovereignty, spread throughout Latin America. We saw the same example in Bolivia nationalizing the gas industry. We saw Ecuador rejoining OPEC. We saw the creation of Petrocaribe, a Caribbean initiative that provided oil at short-term—long-term credit rates to the Caribbean. We saw the provision of oil to—of heating oil to communities in the U.S. under the banner of Citgo, so that Northeastern communities that had to pay onerous prices received oils at subsidized prices, as well. And we saw also Petrosur, the creation of a South American oil body that actually helped negotiate conditions for oil industry.

So, in many ways, many of that is attributable to the policies that the Chávez government instituted. And I think that’s what was sustainable. I think the previous system that had existed before 1998 was unsustainable. And the reality is that with that kind of recasting of oil, and of its symbolic importance as a part of the integral development of social development of Venezuela, we saw that clash between the imaginary Venezuela that saw itself simply as an international oil-producing country, and now reclaiming the oil industry as part and parcel of the social development within Venezuela, a major chasm had developed. And I think that’s what was healed under the Chávez administration.

AMYGOODMAN: Miguel Tinker Salas; and Gregory Wilpert of Venezuelanalysis; Eva Golinger, Venezuelan-American attorney, close friend of President Chávez; Greg Grandin of New York University, New York Public Library; and Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue, we’re going to break and then come back to this discussion—also ask the question: How is it that President Chávez managed to survive a coup against him, that other leaders, from Aristide to Salvador Allende, to President Zelaya of Honduras, did not manage to survive? Stay with us.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: On this day after the death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, we’re going to talk right now about how it is that he survived an attempted coup when other Latin American and Caribbean leaders could not. I want to turn to an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the 2002 coup. The film is called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. The excerpt begins with then-White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer.

PRESSSECRETARYARIFLEISCHER: Let me share with you the administration’s thoughts about what’s taking place in Venezuela. We know that the action encouraged by the Chávez government provoked this crisis. The Chávez government suppressed peaceful demonstrations, fired on unarmed peaceful protesters, resulting in 10 killed and 100 wounded. That is what took place. And a transitional civilian government has been installed.

NARRATOR: Despite the blackout by the Venezuelan private media, members of Chávez’s government had managed to communicate with international television networks, getting the message back to Venezuela via cable TV that Chávez had not resigned and was being held captive.

The palace guard, who had remained loyal to Chávez decided to act. Behind Carmona’s back, a plot was being hatched by Chávez’s men to retake the palace. The plan was for the guard to take up key positions, surround the palace and to wait for a given signal.

With all their positions secured, the signal was given, and the presidential guard moved in. Several members of the newly installed government were taken prisoner, but in the confusion, Carmona and the generals had managed to slip away.

As the guards secured the building, Chávez’s ministers, who had been in hiding for the last two days, began to arrive back to the palace to try and reestablish the legitimate Cabinet.

AMYGOODMAN: That’s a clip from the documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. Michael Shifter in Washington, D.C., of the Inter-American Dialogue, how is it that President Chávez managed to survive this coup and retain power, when so many, from President Aristide of Haiti to Honduras’s Zelaya, to, well, famously, of course, President Allende in Chile, did not survive their coups?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, there’s a lot of—

AMYGOODMAN: The coups against them, I should say, that the U.S. was involved with.

MICHAELSHIFTER: Sure. There’s a lot of history of failed coups in Latin America. And there are other cases, as well. President Chávez himself attempted a coup in 1992 in Venezuela that failed. And this one failed, as well. Fortunately, I think, it failed. And, you know, there are a lot of cases where there’s an attempted overthrow of a democratically elected legitimate government, like Chávez in April of 2002. And obviously, he had a lot of support. Obviously this was, you know, terribly done. And I’m glad that it failed. I think that the statement from the White House was terrible and shameful and disgraceful.

But I think that this is—you know, this is why he didn’t follow the—you know, of Allende and others, I think that the circumstances were just very, very different. I don’t think you can compare this and put this in the same category. The time was different. The circumstances were different. The role of the United States was different. And again, I think that if one looks at a variety of countries, one can see other cases and examples of coups that didn’t succeed. And I’m happy when they don’t succeed, because I think when you have a legitimate government that’s elected by the people and you have an interruption in democracy, that that is a very serious, troubling development.

AMYGOODMAN: Juan, there’s an old Latin—

MICHAELSHIFTER: So I’m glad it didn’t succeed in April 2002.

AMYGOODMAN: There’s an old Latin American—

MICHAELSHIFTER: And I’m glad Chávez’s didn’t, either.

AMYGOODMAN: There’s an old Latin American joke that says, "Why hasn’t the U.S. ever undergone a coup?" And that’s because there’s no U.S. embassy here.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, I’d like to ask Michael Shifter, your sense of where—what the future now holds in terms of Venezuela, the ability of the opposition to mount a strong campaign against Nicolás Maduro, because obviously Maduro is going to be the candidate of the Chávez forces? What do you look for now in the coming days in terms of indications of where the situation in Venezuela will go?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, I think there are going to be elections. I think Maduro is going to be the candidate. I think he has—the chances are that he’s going to be elected. All the polls show that. The opposition is very, very demoralized, very fragmented. They lost in October by 11 points. They lost the governorships in December. They’re looking for a strategy. They’re wondering about their leadership. So I think the government certainly has the upper hand, and I think that the government will come together. There are different factions within Chavismo, but I think they’ll come together, certainly in the short term. So I look, for the short term, for things to be fairly stable and fairly steady under the leadership of Nicolás Maduro. I think that’s probably the likely scenario.

What I’m going to look for is more in the next six to eight months when, if the economic situation continues to deteriorate, and you might want to look for some strains and infighting within the Chávez camp. Nobody can match Chávez’s charisma and his ability to hold together the different forces within Chavismo. He had that unique ability. Maduro, for all of his whatever skills he has, he doesn’t have that talent. And I think that we could see developing some real tensions within the Chávez camp that could really—has the potential, at least, to create some turmoil.

But for the short term, my guess is that things will—that Maduro will be the president. The opposition has a long way to go to regroup and come up with an alternative strategy. Hopefully they’ll work on that and do that. But they just suffered two defeats, and they are figuring out what to do.

AMYGOODMAN: Nicolás Maduro, of course, now is the Venezuelan vice president. In October 2007, when he was Venezuela’s foreign minister, we had a chance to interview him. It was a year after President Chávez had famously referred to then-President George W. Bush as the devil in a speech before the General Assembly. Before we hear from Maduro, let’s go to that clip of Chávez at the U.N. in 2006.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] And the devil came here yesterday. Yesterday, the devil came here, right here, right here. And it smells of sulfur still today.

AMYGOODMAN: That was Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s president, speaking at the U.N. in 2006, referring to George W. Bush. Well, the next year, in 2007, I asked Nicolás Maduro what message he had for the United States.

NICOLÁS MADURO: [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what’s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.

Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it’s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That’s the main message, and that’s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Vice President Nicolás Maduro, then foreign minister of Venezuela, talking with Democracy Now! I wanted to ask you, Eva, you know Nicolás Maduro well. Could you tell us who is he, his origins and development as part of the Chávez movement? And there are some who say that he’s actually more politically to the left than Chávez was in terms of his perspectives and his analysis.

EVAGOLINGER: Yeah, well, I think also the previous response, when talking about the coup and why it didn’t function in Venezuela, even though it did for a 48-hour period—and that needs to be remembered—and talking about, you know, what will happen from now on, showed the sort of position that you see out of a lot of analysts in the United States and around the world that underestimates entirely the Venezuelan people and their capacity, the capacity of President Chávez, as well as others, like Nicolás Maduro.

Nicolás comes from working-class roots. He was a bus driver. He was a union organizer. He’s someone who, you know, was a part of grassroots movements. And he became a part of Chávez’s movement when Chávez led a military rebellion in 1992 to try to oust a murderous and corrupt president at the time, that most of Venezuelans actually supported that rebellion, which did fail. And that’s when Chávez came on the scene, took responsibility for that publicly. He actually went to prison. While he was in prison, Nicolás joined in his movement. And the movement that Chávez had built had originally been out of the military. Chávez was a soldier. He was a lieutenant colonel in the armed forces, in the army.

AMYGOODMAN: And, as Shifter said, attempted a coup first, before he did become—

EVAGOLINGER: Attempted a military rebellion to overthrow the then-President Carlos Andrés Pérez, who had, in two-and-a-half years before, ordered the state security forces to massacre the people of Venezuela when they protested his implementing neoliberal reforms in the country, privatization. More than 3,000 Venezuelans were killed. Mass grave sites were dug. And, you know, no one really knows the numbers that were killed by the government of that time. So a lot of people supported what Chávez was trying to do. Nobody knew him at the time. I mean, that’s when he became known. And that’s when Nicolás Maduro also began to know him.

And so, Chávez began to build, together with this group of grassroots organizers, a movement based on civil-military unity. And that was one of the key factors, actually, that defeated the coup in April 2002 against Chávez, was the fact that the military and the people came together, that people in Venezuela, who had begun a transformation of the country—because a lot of times also what happens in Venezuela is underestimated. It’s seen as, you know, this government came into power, Chávez was elected, and he began to do all these radical reforms. But it’s actually—we call it a revolution because that’s what it is. It’s a systematic transformation of every sector of society. And, you know, that was beginning to take root in 2002 when the coup happened.

And so, that movement of people that Nicolás Maduro was a part of, he was then a member of parliament. He later became the head of parliament, of Venezuela’s National Assembly, president of the assembly. Chávez named him foreign minister in 2006, and he continued in that movement in that position. He was ridiculed nonstop by Venezuelan media, internationally, by the opposition, saying, you know, "Oh, he’s a bus driver. You know, he knows nothing. He has no education. How could he be the top diplomat of the country?" But he became, I think, one of Venezuela’s best foreign ministers that they’ve ever had. I mean, he has led all kinds of treaties and agreements that Venezuela has entered into with countries throughout the world that have benefited Venezuela substantially. You know, most of Venezuelan foreign policy is now based on integration, cooperation and mutual benefit, transfer of technology. I mean, no longer it’s about just what can we get from the other guy.

And so, Nicolás has then become the most intimate adviser of the president, by his side, especially throughout this very difficult period. He was the one who was always with Chávez while he was undergoing his treatments in Cuba, and he was the one that clearly came through as the person with the most capacity to unify Chavismo and to carry on those policies. And I would definitely say that he certainly maintains a very radical and profound leftist position and wholeheartedly will carry on the movement led by Chávez.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Gregory Wilpert, I wanted to ask you about the role of the Venezuelan media, both in opposition to Chávez all this time, especially its role in Venezuelan society, because he’s often been criticized as attempting to muzzle the media.

GREGORYWILPERT: Right. Well, you know, that’s one of the things that constantly critics point out to, is that the media is somehow being repressed in Venezuela. But if you turn on the TV or look at the newspapers, you see constant diatribes and constant criticisms and raising of problems that exist in Venezuela. And so, I mean, it’s very difficult to reconcile that with this claim that there’s some kind of repression against the private media.

The other thing is, people say that Chávez created all these other media outlets that are completely swamping their airwaves, but that’s not true. It’s true that there are many new media outlets, but they only actually get a very small percentage of the viewership. And so, the private media actually still predominates in Venezuela, despite what—the impression that people get from what’s going on. And so—but there’s a much greater diversity of opinions and of freedom of speech, really, because you also have tons of community media. So there’s an incredible amount of debate going on in Venezuela.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to continue this discussion. There will be a seven-day period of mourning. President Hugo Chávez will be buried on Friday. That’s when his funeral will be. That does it for our show, and I want to thank all of our guests: Gregory Wilpert, founder of Venezuelanalysis.com; Eva Golinger, friend and adviser to President Hugo Chávez, author of The Chávez Code ; Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California; Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington; and Greg Grandin, currently Cullman fellow at the New York Public Library. You can go to our website at democracynow.org for complete coverage of Hugo Chávez with our exclusive interviews of both Chávez and Maduro. That’s democracynow.org.

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Wed, 06 Mar 2013 00:00:00 -0500Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez Dieshttp://www.democracynow.org/blog/2013/3/5/breaking_news_hugo_chavez_dies
tag:democracynow.org,2013-03-05:blog/05c059 After a two-year battle with cancer, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has died at the age of 58. The news was delivered by Vice President Nicolás Maduro, who said, &quot;It&#8217;s a moment of deep pain.&quot;
See our interviews with Hugo Chávez below and in-depth look at related coverage.
2009: &quot;Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on How to Tackle Climate Change: We Must Go from Capitalism to Socialism
Part 1: Hugo Chávez: If the Imperialist Government of the White House Dares to Invade Venezuela, the War of 100 Years Will be Unleashed in South America
Part 2: Venezuela&#8217;s President Chávez Offers Cheap Oil to the Poor...of the United States
Debate: With Chávez Ailing, Venezuela&#8217;s Longstanding Divisions Threaten New Political Upheaval
Hugo Chávez to George W. Bush: Gringo Go Home
Click here to see much more coverage of Hugo Chávez on Democracy Now!
After a two-year battle with cancer, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has died at the age of 58. The news was delivered by Vice President Nicolás Maduro, who said, "It’s a moment of deep pain."

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Tue, 05 Mar 2013 17:41:00 -0500Debate: With Chávez Ailing, Venezuela's Longstanding Divisions Threaten New Political Upheavalhttp://www.democracynow.org/2013/1/10/debate_with_chvez_ailing_venezuelas_long
tag:democracynow.org,2013-01-10:en/story/3f13c3 JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Venezuela has postponed today&#8217;s presidential inauguration as Hugo Chávez remains hospitalized in Cuba after complications from a fourth cancer operation. The 58-year-old Chávez, who was first elected in 1998, has not been seen in public nor heard from since his surgery on December 11.
The postponement of the inauguration has set off a political crisis in Venezuela. On Wednesday, Venezuela&#8217;s top court ruled that Chávez could begin a new term today and be sworn in later before the court. Vice President Nicolás Maduro, who is now in charge of the day-to-day government, praised the ruling.
VICE PRESIDENT NICOLÁS MADURO : [translated] In the name of the legitimate government of the commander president, who was re-elected by the Venezuelan people, the leader of this motherland, the government obeys the decision of the Supreme Court of Justice. Their word and their voice is sacred.
AMY GOODMAN : Opposition politicians in Venezuela have argued delaying President Chávez&#8217;s swearing-in for a new term leaves no one legally in charge of Venezuela once the current term ends today. They&#8217;ve called for the appointment of a caretaker president and new elections. Henrique Capriles, who lost October&#8217;s presidential election to Chávez, took aim at Venezuela&#8217;s judicial system.
HENRIQUE CAPRILES : [translated] The Supreme Court decided to resolve a problem for the ruling party. So what can I now say to Venezuelans? I am an example—and excuse me for speaking in first person, but I am an example of how one must fight against a judicial system that doesn&#8217;t work.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Supporters of Chávez have called for a huge rally outside the presidential palace in Caracas today. Allied leaders, including Uruguay&#8217;s José Mujica, Bolivia&#8217;s Evo Morales and Nicaragua&#8217;s Daniel Ortega, are expected to attend.
Meanwhile, The Washington Post reports that the Obama administration has embarked on a discreet, but concerted, weeks-long diplomatic initiative to open channels of communication with the Venezuelan government in the absence of Chávez. In 2002, Chávez survived a coup that toppled him briefly. He has long asserted that that coup was orchestrated by the United States.
AMY GOODMAN : For more on Venezuela, we&#8217;re joined by two guests. Michael Shifter is president of the Inter-American Dialogue, also an adjunct professor of Latin American politics at Georgetown University&#8217;s School of Foreign Service. And from Claremont, California, we&#8217;re joined by Miguel Tinker Salas, a professor at Pomona College, born in Venezuela, author of The Enduring Legacy: Oil, Culture, and Society in Venezuela . His new book, forthcoming, Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know .
Michael Shifter, Miguel Tinker Salas, we welcome you both to Democracy Now! Michael Shifter, talk about what isn&#8217;t happening today, the inauguration, and what you feel needs to take place, which side you take now.
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, thank you very much.
I think that it&#8217;s not a surprise that the inauguration is not taking place today. I think that President Chávez clearly is very ill. I think there are going to be new elections. I think the government basically wants some time to figure out its strategy, to consolidate the authority of Nicolás Maduro, who is the key figure now, who I think will be the candidate of the government in the elections against Capriles. I don&#8217;t know if it&#8217;s going to take place in a month or two months, but it seems to me that that&#8217;s the scenario.
And it strikes me that the important thing in this situation are the politics. The Chávez government controls the executive, obviously, the judicial branch and also the National Assembly. So, they just—they won an election in October. They won regional elections in December. Chávez has enormous compassion—generates enormous compassion and sympathy among the Venezuelan people, so the government has the upper hand. But as we just heard, Henrique Capriles is beginning to come out and make some statements, because I think—I think people are getting ready for an election. I think the government probably has the edge at this point, but that&#8217;s the situation that we&#8217;re in.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, you&#8217;ve questioned whether there is a constitutional crisis, as much of the press reporting has made out, or whether this is really more a strategy of the opposition and external opponents of the Chávez government. Could you talk about that?
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Sure. I mean, if this was Panama, Costa Rica, any other country, Honduras, we would not be having this conversation. The reality is, those constitutions are very similar to the Venezuelan constitution, which clearly states in Article 231 that if the president cannot be inaugurated before the National Assembly on January 10th, he can be or she can be sworn in at a subsequent time before the Supreme Court, so that the issue is not a constitutional crisis, although I think the opposition would like to create a constitutional crisis. And we&#8217;re seeing a lot of echo of that in the national press and the international press.
The reality is that in Venezuela there is a transition, no doubt about that, but the opposition would like to strike while the iron is hot. They see Chávez weak. They see the Chávez movement possibly weak. They&#8217;ve lost two subsequent elections. And what they&#8217;re really looking for is an opportunity to expand their base of support. And the challenge for them is that they really—as they have in the past, they&#8217;ve cut their nose to spite their face. In the past, they have really engaged in a series of undemocratic actions, and they&#8217;re risking, at this point, also drawing on the sympathy vote that Chávez will have and the Chavistas will have. So I think that they&#8217;re very—in a very precarious position, but I don&#8217;t think we have a constitutional crisis in Venezuela. I think we have a series of positions that are trying to precipitate one, but I don&#8217;t see a crisis at this point.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to come back to this discussion and talk about what Hugo Chávez has meant for Venezuela over more than a decade. We&#8217;re speaking with Miguel Tinker Salas of Pomona College and Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C. Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : Our guests, Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C., and Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College. Juan?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Michael Shifter, I want to ask you, you said that you expect that there will be at some point over the next few months an election for a successor to Chávez, it looks likely that way, and that—that Chávez, before he went into the hospital, anointed Nicolás Maduro, who is actually the appointed vice president, not the elected vice president, as his preferred successor. But the constitution says that if he&#8217;s incapacitated, it should be the head of the National Assembly who takes office, also a chavista. Could you talk about these two figures and the differences between them, perceived either by the opposition or even within the chavista camp?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, I think they&#8217;re the two principal figures within Chavismo. Nicolás Maduro is somebody who was previously a union leader. He was in the National Assembly. He was president of the National Assembly. He&#8217;s been foreign minister for the last six years. He has close, strong contacts with the Cuban government. Cabello is a military figure and is very close to factions within the armed forces. He doesn&#8217;t—he has a very different background than Maduro does. But for the purposes—so they are the leading figures of a faction. I mean, Chávez was the only figure that can really unify the whole movement. He had—because of his charisma, because of his authority and just very astute political operations, he was able to do that. No figure comes close to him. These are the two principal ones that remain.
Maduro will be the candidate, because Chávez has designated him as such, but Cabello is going to be—play a very, very important role. The armed forces is a very important institution in Venezuela. Chávez came from the armed forces; Cabello does. And so, you&#8217;re going to see a situation where you&#8217;re going to have to work out deals and agreements and understandings, led by Maduro, but also Cabello would be in there playing an important role.
Now, to the extent that they could keep this together over time, I think, is a major question. Chávez was uniquely capable of doing that. And especially if there&#8217;s a very acute economic crisis and fiscal pressures, you may begin to see some real, very serious infighting among the different factions of Chavismo, which of course would weaken the capacity of the government to sustain itself.
AMY GOODMAN : Professor Tinker Salas, can you respond to Michael Shifter and also talk about the significance of Hugo Chávez, what you think he has meant for Venezuela?
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : I think, fundamentally, Chávez has changed the landscape. But it&#8217;s not just Chávez. I mean, the reality is that in 1998, Venezuela, when Chávez was elected, was at a crisis point. There had been a series of economic crises. The people had lost all faith in the political apparatus. There was a crisis of legitimacy. There was increasing social discontent. Over 85 percent of the population, according to a poll published in The New York Times , thought that the national government had mishandled the oil economy and society. So, again, Chávez was brought to power on a wave of tremendous social and political discontent.
And I think what he has done is—and not only him, but the social movements in Venezuela, have transformed the political landscape. I don&#8217;t think there&#8217;s any going back in Venezuela. I think any illusions that the opposition can return to a pre-1998-Chávez era are gone. And not only has Chávez helped transform Venezuela, but his impact within Latin America has been tremendously significant. The presence of Mujica, of Ortega and of Morales in Venezuela on his portended—or his portended inauguration speak to his impact in Latin America. And I think it has been significant in terms of the creation of a series of forums, such as UNASUR , the CELAC , Union of South American Nations, the Community of Latin American Nations, the ALBA , the Bolivarian Alliance.
Now, internally, in terms of Maduro and Cabello, they represent two sides that complement each other to a very important extent. Maduro comes out of the social movements. He is a student leader. He is a union leader. He has been in the National Assembly. He helped draft the constitution, foreign minister. Cabello, on the other hand, comes out of the civic military tradition that exists in Venezuela, which is very much unlike other countries in Latin America, where you&#8217;ve had, really, a progressive military, dating back to the 1950s and &#8217;60s and &#8217;70s, who have taken sides with social movements. So both of them, in many ways, complement each other in projecting future of the Chavista movement in Venezuela.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, the importance of what happens in Venezuela? People forget that Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world, greater than even Saudi Arabia, and that, therefore, it has an enormous impact on oil politics across the planet. Could you talk about that and how Chávez used that oil wealth to further the social aims of his revolution?
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Well, if we think back, simply, where was Venezuela before 1998? We hardly had heard about Venezuela. It was a faithful ally of the U.S. It was always voting with the U.S., the OAS and the U.N. Venezuela was known for having a supply of oil, an array of very good baseball players, winning the meaningless Miss Universe contest on a regular basis. But other than that, Venezuela really did not have a real big footprint on the regional map or on the international map.
That dramatically changes with Chávez. And it changes because of the social policy. It changes because of the fact that one of the first policies Chávez implemented is, when in office, right around 2001, began to reexamine oil policy and found that a tremendous amount of the oil that Venezuela had in reserves was being classified as shale—that is, as oil sands. And again, reclaiming the national oil company, revising the contracts with those foreign oil companies, and reclassifying the reserves has in fact given Venezuela the largest oil deposit in the world, with potentially much more oil—500 billion barrels—potentially in the future, which means, again, that Venezuela&#8217;s role in terms of oil in rebuttressing OPEC and establishing energy alliances in Latin America, with Petrosur and Petrocaribe, have been fundamental in altering the policy, and then in taking those reserves and implementing a series of social programs.
Granted, the opposition will claim that that money is being misspent, but the reality is, for Venezuelans on the ground, it has improved their lifestyle. Poverty has been decreased by over 20 percent. Destitute poverty has come down to nearly 8 percent. There has been food programs. There have been health programs. There have been aid for pregnant mothers. There has been pension plans. There has now been a new housing program that is responsible for a 20 percent growth in construction, which has now given Venezuela a 5.5 growth during 2012. So we&#8217;ve seen a dramatic change, and that&#8217;s what gives the Chávez movement support, and that&#8217;s what continues to fuel much of the Chavista social movements and process.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But, Michael Shifter, you&#8217;ve been critical of some of this economic growth, and you&#8217;ve raised the issue in some of your writings, that—that it&#8217;s been—that Chávez failed to diversify the economy. But there is the reality that Venezuela now has the lowest income inequality in Latin America. Your—could you expound on some of your concerns about the economic development that has occurred under Chávez?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, I think the results of Chávez—I think, in this day and age, if you have a system of governance and a model where one person makes all the decisions, as we&#8217;ve seen in 14 years under Chávez, it&#8217;s very, very hard to deliver effective results. Oil production, in fact, has declined dramatically in Venezuela, and Venezuela has failed to diversify its economy. It&#8217;s more dependent on oil, but oil has gone—the production of oil has gone down. Venezuela imports everything; it doesn&#8217;t produce anything. So, this is—this is an economy that is really—that is really dependent on a single commodity, that is not performing well. There&#8217;s very little investment, and there&#8217;s very little coming into the country.
And we&#8217;ve seen the results. It has the highest inflation in Latin America. We all know, from Latin American history, that inflation affects—hits the poor the hardest. This is Chávez&#8217;s own constituency. It has an enormously high fiscal deficit. It has—it&#8217;s true that the well-being of Venezuelans generally has improved since 1998, when Hugo Chávez came in. When Chávez came in in 1998, 1999, oil was $10 a barrel. Now it&#8217;s gone over—well over $100. So, he has really ridden this tremendous increase in the price of oil, and he really had a tremendous opportunity, because of his charisma, because of his connection with Venezuelans, and because of the money that he had to spend. But being the fact—the fact that he has really made all the decisions himself and has discouraged a lot of private investment, has been very confrontational and very much of a polarizing figure, he hasn&#8217;t left Latin America more united. It&#8217;s true that Latin America is much more self-confident, more assertive, has enormous pride. I think Chávez deserves credit for contributing to that. But it&#8217;s also a region where there&#8217;s tremendous fragmentation, and there&#8217;s a lot of discord. And I think Chávez, as a polarizing figure, at the same time has also been responsible for that situation, as well.
AMY GOODMAN : In December 2009 , I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes at the U.N. climate change summit in Copenhagen. I asked him what level of emissions reductions he was willing to support.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That&#8217;s the real solution.
AMY GOODMAN : How do you throw away capitalism?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That&#8217;s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.
AMY GOODMAN : I also asked President Chávez what he thought of the U.S. government calling him a dictator.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I&#8217;m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, &quot;They are going to bite us.&quot; And Quixote wisely answers, &quot;Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping.&quot; I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.
AMY GOODMAN : That was President Chávez in Copenhagen in December of 2009. Let me get the response of Professor Salas Tinker to that—Tinker Salas to that, sorry.
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Well, I think that—Tinker Salas. I think that there has been an effort in Venezuela to promote green energy, to promote environmental consciousness. There&#8217;s a lot more to do. Venezuela is very wasteful in terms of oil. Cars consume a tremendous amount of carbon monoxide. So there&#8217;s a tremendous amount that needs to be done. There&#8217;s a beginning consciousness about the environment, but there&#8217;s also a legacy of a hundred years in the oil industry that has really damaged the environment of the country, so there&#8217;s a lot to be done in terms of the country.
But in terms of what Mr. Shifter said previously, Venezuela&#8217;s deficit is not out of line with the rest of Latin America. Its public debt, it&#8217;s less than 7.8 percent—I&#8217;m sorry, its fiscal debt is less than 7.8 percent. Its public debt is about 45 percent—way in line with debt ceilings in terms of Latin America. And Latin America today is more united than ever before. You didn&#8217;t have, 12 years ago, the Union of South American Nations. You didn&#8217;t have CELAC , the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Nations. You didn&#8217;t have Latin Americans resolving their own internal affairs, as was the case in Bolivia when part of Bolivia&#8217;s right wing attempted to separate from Bolivia and you had the president of Chile creating, calling for a meeting of presidents and making a declaration about the integrity of Bolivia. I think that it really speaks to the fact that Latin America is today confident, united, in ways we have never seen before. And I think that Venezuela has played an important role in that as an advocate for regional integration.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Michael Shifter, what about all of these changes at the regional level that Venezuela has helped spearhead? And also, when you mentioned that they have not diversified in terms of oil as their main source of income, they have diversified where their oil goes. Something like 600,000 barrels a day of Venezuelan oil now go to China as opposed to the United States or Western Europe. Your sense of how—the impact of Venezuela on regional politics?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, first of all, on the oil, it&#8217;s true that there&#8217;s some oil that goes to China, but not nearly as much as—as Chávez has—when Chávez came in, he claimed that he was going to do a lot more in diversifying the market. The fact is that—that Venezuela is still very heavily dependent on the U.S. market, and—because of the crude oil, because of the refinery system, it&#8217;s closer, it&#8217;s cheaper, and for a variety of reasons. And, of course, that is the main irony and contradiction of the whole U.S.-Venezuela relationship, is that while political relations have been very tense and full of strain, the oil keeps flowing, and Venezuela keeps selling, and the United States keeps buying it. So, that, I think, is—that, I think, you know, is a situation where I think the shift of the market really hasn&#8217;t happened very much.
I don&#8217;t see—if one looks at these regional organizations—CELAC or UNASUR—there&#8217;s no question that there has been increasing independence, distancing from the United States from Latin America, especially South America. This has to do with other factors besides Chávez, although Chávez has been part of it. The rise in commodity prices, the rise of Brazil, the role of Brazil, has been extremely, extremely significant. But if one looks at a lot of issues on economic questions, political questions, there are tremendous frictions between many Latin American countries. There&#8217;s a lot of discord. There&#8217;s a lot of disunity. There are conflicts between Chile and Peru. There are conflicts between a lot of different countries on a lot of different issues. There are trade problems between Chile—between Argentina and Brazil today. So, I don&#8217;t think the fact that these organizations exist, and have existed for a couple of years, it still remains to be seen how effective they&#8217;re going to be. They&#8217;re very new. And I think that there are a lot of differences, and I think that Chávez has been a polarizing force that has led to a lot of fragmentation in Latin America. I see a more self-confident region, a more assertive region, region with greater pride. As I said before, Chávez is part of that. But at the same time, it&#8217;s fragmented, and I also think he has been a factor in contributing to that tendency, as well.
AMY GOODMAN : Juan González and I interviewed Nicolás Maduro Moros in October 2007, when he then served as Hugo Chávez&#8217;s foreign minister. It was a year after Chávez had famously referred to then-President George W. Bush as the devil in a speech before the United Nations, saying, quote, &quot;The devil came here yesterday; it smells like sulfur today.&quot; I asked Maduro what message he had for the United States.
NICOLÁS MADURO : [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what&#8217;s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.
Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it&#8217;s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That&#8217;s the main message, and that&#8217;s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro Moros, thank you very much.
AMY GOODMAN : Vice President—current Vice President Nicolás Maduro, speaking to us when he was foreign minister in 2007 in New York City. Miguel Tinker Salas, talk about what the U.S. relationship has been with Chávez, both under Bush and now under President Obama, and where Maduro fits into that.
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Well, I think, as you underscored in the piece before this, Maduro has been the foreign minister. And Maduro has been very important in reestablishing relationships with neighboring Colombia. He&#8217;s credited with, in fact, mending fences at a time when a previous administration, Álvaro Uribe, was very confrontational towards Venezuela, and they almost came to the point of breaking relationships. So that relationship has been, in fact, buttressed. And in that sense, Maduro has played a very important role in managing Venezuela&#8217;s foreign relationships with China, with the region&#8217;s—with the countries of the region, with which—with which Venezuela maintains very good relationships.
And the fact that we&#8217;re going to see the different presidents of Latin America today visiting Caracas and others visiting Cuba to see Hugo Chávez speaks to the fact of Venezuela&#8217;s importance in the region, speaks to the fact that it&#8217;s now gained a new prominence, speaks to the fact that Hugo Chávez&#8217;s policy reintegrated Venezuela into Latin America. If you think back again to 1998, Venezuela really did not look south; it only looked north. It looked abroad. Its elites looked abroad. And I think the election of Hugo Chávez forced a very much of an inward look into Venezuela and a lot of self-reflection about Venezuela&#8217;s relationship with the rest of Latin America, with the continent, with the region, back to what some would call its Bolivian roots. And I think that has been a very important contribution.
And there&#8217;s today a sense within Venezuela of its position within Latin America, a reclaiming of its status, of its position, and I think that&#8217;s very, very important in the context of Latin America and U.S.-Latin American relations, because that in fact has informed how the U.S. has treated Venezuela. At first, the Bush administration&#8217;s policy under Condoleezza Rice was to inoculate Latin America from Venezuela, as if Venezuela had some sort of disease that could spread. Unfortunately, the Obama administration promised much and delivered little. It continued the same Bush-era policies. And we&#8217;ve seen very much of a continuity between Bush and Obama. One is heartened to hear that in November the U.S. and Venezuela opened up back channels and began a conversation about the possibility of establishing new relationships and of exchanging ambassadors. And I think that&#8217;s very positive, and one looks forward to that.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, what are you—in the next few days and weeks, what will you be looking for in terms of signs of what&#8217;s going to happen in Venezuela? Clearly, the government has taken the position that really only if the—if President Chávez is out of commission for 90 days, and then can actually renew that for another 90 days, so there&#8217;s basically a 180-day period where he could be incapacitated before they would have to actually be forced to take action in terms of new elections. Talk about what you&#8217;re looking for.
MIGUEL TINKER SALAS : Well, I think that we&#8217;re going to see the opposition continue the campaign. I think they&#8217;re going to continue to claim that there&#8217;s a constitutional crisis. I think they&#8217;re going to try to see if they can create—if divisions exist between Maduro and Cabello. None have been evident, but I think they&#8217;re going to try to play on potential contradictions. They&#8217;re going to continue to increase the international media campaign and pressure to try to depict Venezuela as in the midst of a crisis.
But again, let me underscore that this has been part of a process for the last 14 years. We&#8217;ve seen an opposition that for 14 years has been projecting Venezuela on the edge of the precipice, on the verge of a crisis. And the reality is that life goes on on a normal basis. Most Venezuelans continue to operate, irregardless of whatever the opposition to the government is saying. So I think—I expect to see a process of transition. I think, increasingly, we&#8217;re beginning to see what Chavismo without Chávez might look like. But I don&#8217;t see the country entering a crisis. I don&#8217;t see the country at the edge of a precipice. I think that&#8217;s an awful lot of a discourse that&#8217;s being promoted by the opposition and, unfortunately, being picked up by the international media.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Michael Shifter, how would you see the next few weeks or months, recalling that there were all of these forecasts that once Fidel Castro passed from the scene, that Cuba would change dramatically, but that hasn&#8217;t seemed to have happened so far?
MICHAEL SHIFTER : Well, I think that—my sense is that there&#8217;s going to be an election. I think we&#8217;re in a period where, again, the government is trying to consolidate its position, assert its authority. My sense is that Maduro is going to be the key figure. But I also have got a sense that the government doesn&#8217;t want to wait too long for the—to have elections. I think that they have the advantage, to the extent the election could take place sooner rather than later. And I think they have the edge against the opposition. The opposition is demoralized after its defeats in October and December. They were operating in a context where Chávez is clearly—I can&#8217;t imagine that Chávez is going to come back. I think that he may resign in the next couple of weeks, or at least indicate that he really is not in any position to resume the office of the presidency. And so, that will—there will be elections that will take place. That&#8217;s why Chávez designated Maduro. He acknowledged that himself.
And I think that the Chavismo is in a strong position. I think that there are serious, serious, profound problems in Venezuela, and I think that—economic problems, security problems, other problems. Chávez spent a lot of money in the campaign to win in October. And I think there is a serious fiscal imbalance and fiscal deficit. I think there probably will be a devaluation of some sort or some economic measures that will need to be taken once—if Maduro is elected the next president. But that&#8217;s—we&#8217;re going to see. I don&#8217;t see any imminent collapse or crisis. I think the Chavismo is in a strong position. I think the opposition is—hasn&#8217;t been doing well recently, and they certainly suffered a big blow in October and December. But I do think that if one looks from now until eight months from now or a year from now, I think it&#8217;s going to be very, very interesting to see to what extent Chavismo without Chávez can really maintain its unity. I think there may be serious differences between Cabello and Maduro and other leaders within Chavismo, particularly within the context of very, very acute economic problems. And so, that is what I would look for in the longer term. But I think, in the shorter term, I think Chavismo is in a very—is in a very strong position.
AMY GOODMAN : I wanted to just end on a historical note, going back in time a decade ago, an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the attempted coup of 2002. The film was called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised . The excerpt begins with then-White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer.
PRESS SECRETARY ARI FLEISCHER : Let me share with you the administration&#8217;s thoughts about what&#8217;s taking place in Venezuela. We know that the action encouraged by the Chávez government provoked this crisis. The Chávez government suppressed peaceful demonstrations, fired on unarmed, peaceful protesters, resulting in 10 killed and 100 wounded. That is what took place. And a transitional civilian government has been installed.
NARRATOR : Despite the blackout by the Venezuelan private media, members of Chávez&#8217;s government have managed to communicate with international television networks, getting the message back to Venezuela via cable TV that Chávez had not resigned and was being held captive.
The palace guard, who had remained loyal to Chávez, decided to act. Behind Carmona’s back, a plot was being hatched by Chávez&#8217;s men to retake the palace. The plan was for the guard to take up key positions, surround the palace, and to wait for a given signal. With all their positions secured, the signal was given, and the presidential guard moved in. Several members of the newly installed government were taken prisoner, but in the confusion, Carmona and the generals had managed to slip away.
As the guards secured the building, Chávez&#8217;s ministers, who had been in hiding for the last two days, began to arrive back to the palace to try and reestablish the legitimate cabinet.
AMY GOODMAN : A clip from the documentary, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised . And, of course, we&#8217;ll continue to follow developments in Venezuela as Hugo Chávez remains ill with cancer in Cuba. We want to thank Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California, and Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C.
This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . When we come back, we look at a challenge to the stop-and-frisk program in New York. Stay with us. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Venezuela has postponed today’s presidential inauguration as Hugo Chávez remains hospitalized in Cuba after complications from a fourth cancer operation. The 58-year-old Chávez, who was first elected in 1998, has not been seen in public nor heard from since his surgery on December 11.

The postponement of the inauguration has set off a political crisis in Venezuela. On Wednesday, Venezuela’s top court ruled that Chávez could begin a new term today and be sworn in later before the court. Vice President Nicolás Maduro, who is now in charge of the day-to-day government, praised the ruling.

VICEPRESIDENT NICOLÁS MADURO: [translated] In the name of the legitimate government of the commander president, who was re-elected by the Venezuelan people, the leader of this motherland, the government obeys the decision of the Supreme Court of Justice. Their word and their voice is sacred.

AMYGOODMAN: Opposition politicians in Venezuela have argued delaying President Chávez’s swearing-in for a new term leaves no one legally in charge of Venezuela once the current term ends today. They’ve called for the appointment of a caretaker president and new elections. Henrique Capriles, who lost October’s presidential election to Chávez, took aim at Venezuela’s judicial system.

HENRIQUECAPRILES: [translated] The Supreme Court decided to resolve a problem for the ruling party. So what can I now say to Venezuelans? I am an example—and excuse me for speaking in first person, but I am an example of how one must fight against a judicial system that doesn’t work.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Supporters of Chávez have called for a huge rally outside the presidential palace in Caracas today. Allied leaders, including Uruguay’s José Mujica, Bolivia’s Evo Morales and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, are expected to attend.

Meanwhile, The Washington Post reports that the Obama administration has embarked on a discreet, but concerted, weeks-long diplomatic initiative to open channels of communication with the Venezuelan government in the absence of Chávez. In 2002, Chávez survived a coup that toppled him briefly. He has long asserted that that coup was orchestrated by the United States.

AMYGOODMAN: For more on Venezuela, we’re joined by two guests. Michael Shifter is president of the Inter-American Dialogue, also an adjunct professor of Latin American politics at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. And from Claremont, California, we’re joined by Miguel Tinker Salas, a professor at Pomona College, born in Venezuela, author of The Enduring Legacy: Oil, Culture, and Society in Venezuela. His new book, forthcoming, Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know.

Michael Shifter, Miguel Tinker Salas, we welcome you both to Democracy Now! Michael Shifter, talk about what isn’t happening today, the inauguration, and what you feel needs to take place, which side you take now.

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, thank you very much.

I think that it’s not a surprise that the inauguration is not taking place today. I think that President Chávez clearly is very ill. I think there are going to be new elections. I think the government basically wants some time to figure out its strategy, to consolidate the authority of Nicolás Maduro, who is the key figure now, who I think will be the candidate of the government in the elections against Capriles. I don’t know if it’s going to take place in a month or two months, but it seems to me that that’s the scenario.

And it strikes me that the important thing in this situation are the politics. The Chávez government controls the executive, obviously, the judicial branch and also the National Assembly. So, they just—they won an election in October. They won regional elections in December. Chávez has enormous compassion—generates enormous compassion and sympathy among the Venezuelan people, so the government has the upper hand. But as we just heard, Henrique Capriles is beginning to come out and make some statements, because I think—I think people are getting ready for an election. I think the government probably has the edge at this point, but that’s the situation that we’re in.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, you’ve questioned whether there is a constitutional crisis, as much of the press reporting has made out, or whether this is really more a strategy of the opposition and external opponents of the Chávez government. Could you talk about that?

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Sure. I mean, if this was Panama, Costa Rica, any other country, Honduras, we would not be having this conversation. The reality is, those constitutions are very similar to the Venezuelan constitution, which clearly states in Article 231 that if the president cannot be inaugurated before the National Assembly on January 10th, he can be or she can be sworn in at a subsequent time before the Supreme Court, so that the issue is not a constitutional crisis, although I think the opposition would like to create a constitutional crisis. And we’re seeing a lot of echo of that in the national press and the international press.

The reality is that in Venezuela there is a transition, no doubt about that, but the opposition would like to strike while the iron is hot. They see Chávez weak. They see the Chávez movement possibly weak. They’ve lost two subsequent elections. And what they’re really looking for is an opportunity to expand their base of support. And the challenge for them is that they really—as they have in the past, they’ve cut their nose to spite their face. In the past, they have really engaged in a series of undemocratic actions, and they’re risking, at this point, also drawing on the sympathy vote that Chávez will have and the Chavistas will have. So I think that they’re very—in a very precarious position, but I don’t think we have a constitutional crisis in Venezuela. I think we have a series of positions that are trying to precipitate one, but I don’t see a crisis at this point.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to come back to this discussion and talk about what Hugo Chávez has meant for Venezuela over more than a decade. We’re speaking with Miguel Tinker Salas of Pomona College and Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C. Stay with us.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Michael Shifter, I want to ask you, you said that you expect that there will be at some point over the next few months an election for a successor to Chávez, it looks likely that way, and that—that Chávez, before he went into the hospital, anointed Nicolás Maduro, who is actually the appointed vice president, not the elected vice president, as his preferred successor. But the constitution says that if he’s incapacitated, it should be the head of the National Assembly who takes office, also a chavista. Could you talk about these two figures and the differences between them, perceived either by the opposition or even within the chavista camp?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, I think they’re the two principal figures within Chavismo. Nicolás Maduro is somebody who was previously a union leader. He was in the National Assembly. He was president of the National Assembly. He’s been foreign minister for the last six years. He has close, strong contacts with the Cuban government. Cabello is a military figure and is very close to factions within the armed forces. He doesn’t—he has a very different background than Maduro does. But for the purposes—so they are the leading figures of a faction. I mean, Chávez was the only figure that can really unify the whole movement. He had—because of his charisma, because of his authority and just very astute political operations, he was able to do that. No figure comes close to him. These are the two principal ones that remain.

Maduro will be the candidate, because Chávez has designated him as such, but Cabello is going to be—play a very, very important role. The armed forces is a very important institution in Venezuela. Chávez came from the armed forces; Cabello does. And so, you’re going to see a situation where you’re going to have to work out deals and agreements and understandings, led by Maduro, but also Cabello would be in there playing an important role.

Now, to the extent that they could keep this together over time, I think, is a major question. Chávez was uniquely capable of doing that. And especially if there’s a very acute economic crisis and fiscal pressures, you may begin to see some real, very serious infighting among the different factions of Chavismo, which of course would weaken the capacity of the government to sustain itself.

AMYGOODMAN: Professor Tinker Salas, can you respond to Michael Shifter and also talk about the significance of Hugo Chávez, what you think he has meant for Venezuela?

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: I think, fundamentally, Chávez has changed the landscape. But it’s not just Chávez. I mean, the reality is that in 1998, Venezuela, when Chávez was elected, was at a crisis point. There had been a series of economic crises. The people had lost all faith in the political apparatus. There was a crisis of legitimacy. There was increasing social discontent. Over 85 percent of the population, according to a poll published in The New York Times, thought that the national government had mishandled the oil economy and society. So, again, Chávez was brought to power on a wave of tremendous social and political discontent.

And I think what he has done is—and not only him, but the social movements in Venezuela, have transformed the political landscape. I don’t think there’s any going back in Venezuela. I think any illusions that the opposition can return to a pre-1998-Chávez era are gone. And not only has Chávez helped transform Venezuela, but his impact within Latin America has been tremendously significant. The presence of Mujica, of Ortega and of Morales in Venezuela on his portended—or his portended inauguration speak to his impact in Latin America. And I think it has been significant in terms of the creation of a series of forums, such as UNASUR, the CELAC, Union of South American Nations, the Community of Latin American Nations, the ALBA, the Bolivarian Alliance.

Now, internally, in terms of Maduro and Cabello, they represent two sides that complement each other to a very important extent. Maduro comes out of the social movements. He is a student leader. He is a union leader. He has been in the National Assembly. He helped draft the constitution, foreign minister. Cabello, on the other hand, comes out of the civic military tradition that exists in Venezuela, which is very much unlike other countries in Latin America, where you’ve had, really, a progressive military, dating back to the 1950s and ’60s and ’70s, who have taken sides with social movements. So both of them, in many ways, complement each other in projecting future of the Chavista movement in Venezuela.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, the importance of what happens in Venezuela? People forget that Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world, greater than even Saudi Arabia, and that, therefore, it has an enormous impact on oil politics across the planet. Could you talk about that and how Chávez used that oil wealth to further the social aims of his revolution?

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Well, if we think back, simply, where was Venezuela before 1998? We hardly had heard about Venezuela. It was a faithful ally of the U.S. It was always voting with the U.S., the OAS and the U.N. Venezuela was known for having a supply of oil, an array of very good baseball players, winning the meaningless Miss Universe contest on a regular basis. But other than that, Venezuela really did not have a real big footprint on the regional map or on the international map.

That dramatically changes with Chávez. And it changes because of the social policy. It changes because of the fact that one of the first policies Chávez implemented is, when in office, right around 2001, began to reexamine oil policy and found that a tremendous amount of the oil that Venezuela had in reserves was being classified as shale—that is, as oil sands. And again, reclaiming the national oil company, revising the contracts with those foreign oil companies, and reclassifying the reserves has in fact given Venezuela the largest oil deposit in the world, with potentially much more oil—500 billion barrels—potentially in the future, which means, again, that Venezuela’s role in terms of oil in rebuttressing OPEC and establishing energy alliances in Latin America, with Petrosur and Petrocaribe, have been fundamental in altering the policy, and then in taking those reserves and implementing a series of social programs.

Granted, the opposition will claim that that money is being misspent, but the reality is, for Venezuelans on the ground, it has improved their lifestyle. Poverty has been decreased by over 20 percent. Destitute poverty has come down to nearly 8 percent. There has been food programs. There have been health programs. There have been aid for pregnant mothers. There has been pension plans. There has now been a new housing program that is responsible for a 20 percent growth in construction, which has now given Venezuela a 5.5 growth during 2012. So we’ve seen a dramatic change, and that’s what gives the Chávez movement support, and that’s what continues to fuel much of the Chavista social movements and process.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But, Michael Shifter, you’ve been critical of some of this economic growth, and you’ve raised the issue in some of your writings, that—that it’s been—that Chávez failed to diversify the economy. But there is the reality that Venezuela now has the lowest income inequality in Latin America. Your—could you expound on some of your concerns about the economic development that has occurred under Chávez?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, I think the results of Chávez—I think, in this day and age, if you have a system of governance and a model where one person makes all the decisions, as we’ve seen in 14 years under Chávez, it’s very, very hard to deliver effective results. Oil production, in fact, has declined dramatically in Venezuela, and Venezuela has failed to diversify its economy. It’s more dependent on oil, but oil has gone—the production of oil has gone down. Venezuela imports everything; it doesn’t produce anything. So, this is—this is an economy that is really—that is really dependent on a single commodity, that is not performing well. There’s very little investment, and there’s very little coming into the country.

And we’ve seen the results. It has the highest inflation in Latin America. We all know, from Latin American history, that inflation affects—hits the poor the hardest. This is Chávez’s own constituency. It has an enormously high fiscal deficit. It has—it’s true that the well-being of Venezuelans generally has improved since 1998, when Hugo Chávez came in. When Chávez came in in 1998, 1999, oil was $10 a barrel. Now it’s gone over—well over $100. So, he has really ridden this tremendous increase in the price of oil, and he really had a tremendous opportunity, because of his charisma, because of his connection with Venezuelans, and because of the money that he had to spend. But being the fact—the fact that he has really made all the decisions himself and has discouraged a lot of private investment, has been very confrontational and very much of a polarizing figure, he hasn’t left Latin America more united. It’s true that Latin America is much more self-confident, more assertive, has enormous pride. I think Chávez deserves credit for contributing to that. But it’s also a region where there’s tremendous fragmentation, and there’s a lot of discord. And I think Chávez, as a polarizing figure, at the same time has also been responsible for that situation, as well.

AMYGOODMAN: In December 2009, I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes at the U.N. climate change summit in Copenhagen. I asked him what level of emissions reductions he was willing to support.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That’s the real solution.

AMYGOODMAN: How do you throw away capitalism?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That’s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.

AMYGOODMAN: I also asked President Chávez what he thought of the U.S. government calling him a dictator.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I’m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, "They are going to bite us." And Quixote wisely answers, "Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping." I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.

AMYGOODMAN: That was President Chávez in Copenhagen in December of 2009. Let me get the response of Professor Salas Tinker to that—Tinker Salas to that, sorry.

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Well, I think that—Tinker Salas. I think that there has been an effort in Venezuela to promote green energy, to promote environmental consciousness. There’s a lot more to do. Venezuela is very wasteful in terms of oil. Cars consume a tremendous amount of carbon monoxide. So there’s a tremendous amount that needs to be done. There’s a beginning consciousness about the environment, but there’s also a legacy of a hundred years in the oil industry that has really damaged the environment of the country, so there’s a lot to be done in terms of the country.

But in terms of what Mr. Shifter said previously, Venezuela’s deficit is not out of line with the rest of Latin America. Its public debt, it’s less than 7.8 percent—I’m sorry, its fiscal debt is less than 7.8 percent. Its public debt is about 45 percent—way in line with debt ceilings in terms of Latin America. And Latin America today is more united than ever before. You didn’t have, 12 years ago, the Union of South American Nations. You didn’t have CELAC, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Nations. You didn’t have Latin Americans resolving their own internal affairs, as was the case in Bolivia when part of Bolivia’s right wing attempted to separate from Bolivia and you had the president of Chile creating, calling for a meeting of presidents and making a declaration about the integrity of Bolivia. I think that it really speaks to the fact that Latin America is today confident, united, in ways we have never seen before. And I think that Venezuela has played an important role in that as an advocate for regional integration.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Michael Shifter, what about all of these changes at the regional level that Venezuela has helped spearhead? And also, when you mentioned that they have not diversified in terms of oil as their main source of income, they have diversified where their oil goes. Something like 600,000 barrels a day of Venezuelan oil now go to China as opposed to the United States or Western Europe. Your sense of how—the impact of Venezuela on regional politics?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, first of all, on the oil, it’s true that there’s some oil that goes to China, but not nearly as much as—as Chávez has—when Chávez came in, he claimed that he was going to do a lot more in diversifying the market. The fact is that—that Venezuela is still very heavily dependent on the U.S. market, and—because of the crude oil, because of the refinery system, it’s closer, it’s cheaper, and for a variety of reasons. And, of course, that is the main irony and contradiction of the whole U.S.-Venezuela relationship, is that while political relations have been very tense and full of strain, the oil keeps flowing, and Venezuela keeps selling, and the United States keeps buying it. So, that, I think, is—that, I think, you know, is a situation where I think the shift of the market really hasn’t happened very much.

I don’t see—if one looks at these regional organizations—CELAC or UNASUR—there’s no question that there has been increasing independence, distancing from the United States from Latin America, especially South America. This has to do with other factors besides Chávez, although Chávez has been part of it. The rise in commodity prices, the rise of Brazil, the role of Brazil, has been extremely, extremely significant. But if one looks at a lot of issues on economic questions, political questions, there are tremendous frictions between many Latin American countries. There’s a lot of discord. There’s a lot of disunity. There are conflicts between Chile and Peru. There are conflicts between a lot of different countries on a lot of different issues. There are trade problems between Chile—between Argentina and Brazil today. So, I don’t think the fact that these organizations exist, and have existed for a couple of years, it still remains to be seen how effective they’re going to be. They’re very new. And I think that there are a lot of differences, and I think that Chávez has been a polarizing force that has led to a lot of fragmentation in Latin America. I see a more self-confident region, a more assertive region, region with greater pride. As I said before, Chávez is part of that. But at the same time, it’s fragmented, and I also think he has been a factor in contributing to that tendency, as well.

AMYGOODMAN: Juan González and I interviewed Nicolás Maduro Moros in October 2007, when he then served as Hugo Chávez’s foreign minister. It was a year after Chávez had famously referred to then-President George W. Bush as the devil in a speech before the United Nations, saying, quote, "The devil came here yesterday; it smells like sulfur today." I asked Maduro what message he had for the United States.

NICOLÁS MADURO: [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what’s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.

Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it’s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That’s the main message, and that’s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.

AMYGOODMAN: Vice President—current Vice President Nicolás Maduro, speaking to us when he was foreign minister in 2007 in New York City. Miguel Tinker Salas, talk about what the U.S. relationship has been with Chávez, both under Bush and now under President Obama, and where Maduro fits into that.

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Well, I think, as you underscored in the piece before this, Maduro has been the foreign minister. And Maduro has been very important in reestablishing relationships with neighboring Colombia. He’s credited with, in fact, mending fences at a time when a previous administration, Álvaro Uribe, was very confrontational towards Venezuela, and they almost came to the point of breaking relationships. So that relationship has been, in fact, buttressed. And in that sense, Maduro has played a very important role in managing Venezuela’s foreign relationships with China, with the region’s—with the countries of the region, with which—with which Venezuela maintains very good relationships.

And the fact that we’re going to see the different presidents of Latin America today visiting Caracas and others visiting Cuba to see Hugo Chávez speaks to the fact of Venezuela’s importance in the region, speaks to the fact that it’s now gained a new prominence, speaks to the fact that Hugo Chávez’s policy reintegrated Venezuela into Latin America. If you think back again to 1998, Venezuela really did not look south; it only looked north. It looked abroad. Its elites looked abroad. And I think the election of Hugo Chávez forced a very much of an inward look into Venezuela and a lot of self-reflection about Venezuela’s relationship with the rest of Latin America, with the continent, with the region, back to what some would call its Bolivian roots. And I think that has been a very important contribution.

And there’s today a sense within Venezuela of its position within Latin America, a reclaiming of its status, of its position, and I think that’s very, very important in the context of Latin America and U.S.-Latin American relations, because that in fact has informed how the U.S. has treated Venezuela. At first, the Bush administration’s policy under Condoleezza Rice was to inoculate Latin America from Venezuela, as if Venezuela had some sort of disease that could spread. Unfortunately, the Obama administration promised much and delivered little. It continued the same Bush-era policies. And we’ve seen very much of a continuity between Bush and Obama. One is heartened to hear that in November the U.S. and Venezuela opened up back channels and began a conversation about the possibility of establishing new relationships and of exchanging ambassadors. And I think that’s very positive, and one looks forward to that.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Miguel Tinker Salas, what are you—in the next few days and weeks, what will you be looking for in terms of signs of what’s going to happen in Venezuela? Clearly, the government has taken the position that really only if the—if President Chávez is out of commission for 90 days, and then can actually renew that for another 90 days, so there’s basically a 180-day period where he could be incapacitated before they would have to actually be forced to take action in terms of new elections. Talk about what you’re looking for.

MIGUELTINKERSALAS: Well, I think that we’re going to see the opposition continue the campaign. I think they’re going to continue to claim that there’s a constitutional crisis. I think they’re going to try to see if they can create—if divisions exist between Maduro and Cabello. None have been evident, but I think they’re going to try to play on potential contradictions. They’re going to continue to increase the international media campaign and pressure to try to depict Venezuela as in the midst of a crisis.

But again, let me underscore that this has been part of a process for the last 14 years. We’ve seen an opposition that for 14 years has been projecting Venezuela on the edge of the precipice, on the verge of a crisis. And the reality is that life goes on on a normal basis. Most Venezuelans continue to operate, irregardless of whatever the opposition to the government is saying. So I think—I expect to see a process of transition. I think, increasingly, we’re beginning to see what Chavismo without Chávez might look like. But I don’t see the country entering a crisis. I don’t see the country at the edge of a precipice. I think that’s an awful lot of a discourse that’s being promoted by the opposition and, unfortunately, being picked up by the international media.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Michael Shifter, how would you see the next few weeks or months, recalling that there were all of these forecasts that once Fidel Castro passed from the scene, that Cuba would change dramatically, but that hasn’t seemed to have happened so far?

MICHAELSHIFTER: Well, I think that—my sense is that there’s going to be an election. I think we’re in a period where, again, the government is trying to consolidate its position, assert its authority. My sense is that Maduro is going to be the key figure. But I also have got a sense that the government doesn’t want to wait too long for the—to have elections. I think that they have the advantage, to the extent the election could take place sooner rather than later. And I think they have the edge against the opposition. The opposition is demoralized after its defeats in October and December. They were operating in a context where Chávez is clearly—I can’t imagine that Chávez is going to come back. I think that he may resign in the next couple of weeks, or at least indicate that he really is not in any position to resume the office of the presidency. And so, that will—there will be elections that will take place. That’s why Chávez designated Maduro. He acknowledged that himself.

And I think that the Chavismo is in a strong position. I think that there are serious, serious, profound problems in Venezuela, and I think that—economic problems, security problems, other problems. Chávez spent a lot of money in the campaign to win in October. And I think there is a serious fiscal imbalance and fiscal deficit. I think there probably will be a devaluation of some sort or some economic measures that will need to be taken once—if Maduro is elected the next president. But that’s—we’re going to see. I don’t see any imminent collapse or crisis. I think the Chavismo is in a strong position. I think the opposition is—hasn’t been doing well recently, and they certainly suffered a big blow in October and December. But I do think that if one looks from now until eight months from now or a year from now, I think it’s going to be very, very interesting to see to what extent Chavismo without Chávez can really maintain its unity. I think there may be serious differences between Cabello and Maduro and other leaders within Chavismo, particularly within the context of very, very acute economic problems. And so, that is what I would look for in the longer term. But I think, in the shorter term, I think Chavismo is in a very—is in a very strong position.

AMYGOODMAN: I wanted to just end on a historical note, going back in time a decade ago, an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the attempted coup of 2002. The film was called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. The excerpt begins with then-White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer.

PRESSSECRETARYARIFLEISCHER: Let me share with you the administration’s thoughts about what’s taking place in Venezuela. We know that the action encouraged by the Chávez government provoked this crisis. The Chávez government suppressed peaceful demonstrations, fired on unarmed, peaceful protesters, resulting in 10 killed and 100 wounded. That is what took place. And a transitional civilian government has been installed.

NARRATOR: Despite the blackout by the Venezuelan private media, members of Chávez’s government have managed to communicate with international television networks, getting the message back to Venezuela via cable TV that Chávez had not resigned and was being held captive.

The palace guard, who had remained loyal to Chávez, decided to act. Behind Carmona’s back, a plot was being hatched by Chávez’s men to retake the palace. The plan was for the guard to take up key positions, surround the palace, and to wait for a given signal. With all their positions secured, the signal was given, and the presidential guard moved in. Several members of the newly installed government were taken prisoner, but in the confusion, Carmona and the generals had managed to slip away.

As the guards secured the building, Chávez’s ministers, who had been in hiding for the last two days, began to arrive back to the palace to try and reestablish the legitimate cabinet.

AMYGOODMAN: A clip from the documentary, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. And, of course, we’ll continue to follow developments in Venezuela as Hugo Chávez remains ill with cancer in Cuba. We want to thank Miguel Tinker Salas, professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California, and Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C.

This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. When we come back, we look at a challenge to the stop-and-frisk program in New York. Stay with us.

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Thu, 10 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0500VIDEO: Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on Climate Change: "We Must Go from Capitalism to Socialism"http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2012/12/12/video_venezuelan_president_hugo_chavez_on_climate_change_we_must_go_from_capitalism_to_socialism
tag:democracynow.org,2012-12-12:blog/884067 As Venezuela says President Hugo Chávez has undergone successful cancer surgery in Cuba, we revisit a 2009 interview in which he discusses climate change and President Obama. Democracy Now! &#8217;s Amy Goodman spoke with Chávez at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. He called the summit undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. &quot;We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet,&quot; said Chávez. &quot;That requires a change in the economic model: we must go from capitalism to socialism.&quot;
AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . I&#8217;m Amy Goodman. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez spared no criticism of the climate conference in Copenhagen. At a joint news conference he held with the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, on Friday afternoon—this was before President Obama announced the accord—Chávez called the proceedings undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. He described President Obama as having won the &quot;Nobel War Prize&quot; and said the world still smelled of sulfur, referring to his comments about President Bush at the United Nations last year.
Well, shortly after the news conference, I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes.
AMY GOODMAN : You sell more oil to the United States than any country but Canada. Your economy depends on oil, yet you are here at a climate change summit. What&#8217;s your proposal?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The problem is not the oil, but what they do with the oil. The United States is the biggest spender of oil and of all the planet resources. Oil is a very valuable resource for life—electric heaters. We must have to transition ourselves to a post-oil era. And that&#8217;s what we must discuss: searching and developing new sources of energy. And that requires scientific research. That requires investment. And the developed countries must be the ones to assume this responsibility first.
AMY GOODMAN : What level of emissions are you willing to support reductions of emissions?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That&#8217;s the real solution.
AMY GOODMAN : How do you throw away capitalism?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That&#8217;s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.
AMY GOODMAN : President Obama—what is your reaction to his speech today?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] Obama is a big frustration. In my opinion, Obama can become one of the biggest frustrations in the history for many people, not for me, but for the people of the United States that voted for him and saw him as a symbol of hope for change. But he has given continually to the most aggressive Bush policies, the imperialist policies.
AMY GOODMAN : What example of that?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The war. I told Obama, when he took the initiative to come visit us in the Summit of the Americas—we talked for a few minutes. I told him, &quot;Obama, let&#8217;s work for peace in Colombia. That&#8217;s what I am proposing. Let&#8217;s get a team together to analyze the problem.&quot; But absolutely nothing. He is now installing seven military bases in Colombia. That&#8217;s just one example.
And in Iraq and Afghanistan, policies of war. Guantánamo, it is a great frustration. And I feel sorry, not for me. You are from the United States. I feel sorry for you, because you deserve a government that takes care of the problems of the people of the United States and stops thinking about dominating the rest of the world and just governs over the United States, eradicates the problems of the United States, the poverty, the inequality, which gets bigger every day, the unemployment, families on the street, homeless, without Social Security, diseases. I wish for you to get a government that truly takes care of you first and then works towards peace for the rest of the world.
AMY GOODMAN : The U.S. government calls you a dictator. What is your response?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I&#8217;m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, &quot;They are going to bite us.&quot; And Quixote wisely answers, &quot;Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping.&quot; I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, speaking to us in Copenhagen on Friday.
As Venezuela says President Hugo Chávez has undergone successful cancer surgery in Cuba, we revisit a 2009 interview in which he discusses climate change and President Obama. Democracy Now!’s Amy Goodman spoke with Chávez at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. He called the summit undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. "We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet," said Chávez. "That requires a change in the economic model: we must go from capitalism to socialism."

AMYGOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez spared no criticism of the climate conference in Copenhagen. At a joint news conference he held with the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, on Friday afternoon—this was before President Obama announced the accord—Chávez called the proceedings undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. He described President Obama as having won the "Nobel War Prize" and said the world still smelled of sulfur, referring to his comments about President Bush at the United Nations last year.

Well, shortly after the news conference, I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes.

AMYGOODMAN: You sell more oil to the United States than any country but Canada. Your economy depends on oil, yet you are here at a climate change summit. What’s your proposal?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The problem is not the oil, but what they do with the oil. The United States is the biggest spender of oil and of all the planet resources. Oil is a very valuable resource for life—electric heaters. We must have to transition ourselves to a post-oil era. And that’s what we must discuss: searching and developing new sources of energy. And that requires scientific research. That requires investment. And the developed countries must be the ones to assume this responsibility first.

AMYGOODMAN: What level of emissions are you willing to support reductions of emissions?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That’s the real solution.

AMYGOODMAN: How do you throw away capitalism?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That’s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.

AMYGOODMAN: President Obama—what is your reaction to his speech today?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] Obama is a big frustration. In my opinion, Obama can become one of the biggest frustrations in the history for many people, not for me, but for the people of the United States that voted for him and saw him as a symbol of hope for change. But he has given continually to the most aggressive Bush policies, the imperialist policies.

AMYGOODMAN: What example of that?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The war. I told Obama, when he took the initiative to come visit us in the Summit of the Americas—we talked for a few minutes. I told him, "Obama, let’s work for peace in Colombia. That’s what I am proposing. Let’s get a team together to analyze the problem." But absolutely nothing. He is now installing seven military bases in Colombia. That’s just one example.

And in Iraq and Afghanistan, policies of war. Guantánamo, it is a great frustration. And I feel sorry, not for me. You are from the United States. I feel sorry for you, because you deserve a government that takes care of the problems of the people of the United States and stops thinking about dominating the rest of the world and just governs over the United States, eradicates the problems of the United States, the poverty, the inequality, which gets bigger every day, the unemployment, families on the street, homeless, without Social Security, diseases. I wish for you to get a government that truly takes care of you first and then works towards peace for the rest of the world.

AMYGOODMAN: The U.S. government calls you a dictator. What is your response?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I’m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, "They are going to bite us." And Quixote wisely answers, "Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping." I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.

AMYGOODMAN: Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, speaking to us in Copenhagen on Friday.

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Wed, 12 Dec 2012 13:51:00 -0500VIDEO: Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on Climate Change: "We Must Go from Capitalism to Socialism" As Venezuela says President Hugo Chávez has undergone successful cancer surgery in Cuba, we revisit a 2009 interview in which he discusses climate change and President Obama. Democracy Now! &#8217;s Amy Goodman spoke with Chávez at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. He called the summit undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. &quot;We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet,&quot; said Chávez. &quot;That requires a change in the economic model: we must go from capitalism to socialism.&quot;
AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . I&#8217;m Amy Goodman. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez spared no criticism of the climate conference in Copenhagen. At a joint news conference he held with the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, on Friday afternoon—this was before President Obama announced the accord—Chávez called the proceedings undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. He described President Obama as having won the &quot;Nobel War Prize&quot; and said the world still smelled of sulfur, referring to his comments about President Bush at the United Nations last year.
Well, shortly after the news conference, I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes.
AMY GOODMAN : You sell more oil to the United States than any country but Canada. Your economy depends on oil, yet you are here at a climate change summit. What&#8217;s your proposal?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The problem is not the oil, but what they do with the oil. The United States is the biggest spender of oil and of all the planet resources. Oil is a very valuable resource for life—electric heaters. We must have to transition ourselves to a post-oil era. And that&#8217;s what we must discuss: searching and developing new sources of energy. And that requires scientific research. That requires investment. And the developed countries must be the ones to assume this responsibility first.
AMY GOODMAN : What level of emissions are you willing to support reductions of emissions?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That&#8217;s the real solution.
AMY GOODMAN : How do you throw away capitalism?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That&#8217;s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.
AMY GOODMAN : President Obama—what is your reaction to his speech today?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] Obama is a big frustration. In my opinion, Obama can become one of the biggest frustrations in the history for many people, not for me, but for the people of the United States that voted for him and saw him as a symbol of hope for change. But he has given continually to the most aggressive Bush policies, the imperialist policies.
AMY GOODMAN : What example of that?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The war. I told Obama, when he took the initiative to come visit us in the Summit of the Americas—we talked for a few minutes. I told him, &quot;Obama, let&#8217;s work for peace in Colombia. That&#8217;s what I am proposing. Let&#8217;s get a team together to analyze the problem.&quot; But absolutely nothing. He is now installing seven military bases in Colombia. That&#8217;s just one example.
And in Iraq and Afghanistan, policies of war. Guantánamo, it is a great frustration. And I feel sorry, not for me. You are from the United States. I feel sorry for you, because you deserve a government that takes care of the problems of the people of the United States and stops thinking about dominating the rest of the world and just governs over the United States, eradicates the problems of the United States, the poverty, the inequality, which gets bigger every day, the unemployment, families on the street, homeless, without Social Security, diseases. I wish for you to get a government that truly takes care of you first and then works towards peace for the rest of the world.
AMY GOODMAN : The U.S. government calls you a dictator. What is your response?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I&#8217;m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, &quot;They are going to bite us.&quot; And Quixote wisely answers, &quot;Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping.&quot; I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, speaking to us in Copenhagen on Friday. nonadulttv-gDemocracy Now!NewsAcademy Award-Winning Filmmaker Oliver Stone Tackles Latin America's Political Upheaval in "South of the Border", US Financial Crisis in Sequel to Iconic "Wall Street"http://www.democracynow.org/2010/6/21/academy_award_winning_filmmaker_oliver_stone
tag:democracynow.org,2010-06-21:en/story/431f92 JUAN GONZALEZ : Today we spend the hour south of the border on the political changes that are sweeping across South America.
Academy Award-winning filmmaker Oliver Stone has taken on three American presidents in JFK , Nixon and W . A Vietnam War veteran, he was decorated with a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart. As a filmmaker, he&#8217;s tackled the most controversial aspects of the war in his classics Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July . He looked at the greed of the financial industry in the Hollywood hit Wall Street , and the sequel, Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps , premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last month.
Well, now the acclaimed director of films like Salvador , Comandante and Looking for Fidel , returns to Latin America. In his latest film, releasing this week in the United States, Oliver Stone takes a road trip across South America, meeting with seven presidents from the continent. Here&#8217;s the trailer. It includes Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, Argentine president Cristina Kirchner and her husband, former president Néstor Kirchner, Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa.
OLIVER STONE : Who is Hugo Chávez? Some believe he is the enemy
JOHN ROBERTS , CNN : He&#8217;s more dangerous than bin Laden. And the effects of Chávez&#8217;s war against America could eclipse those of 9/11.
OLIVER STONE : Some believe he is the answer.
MAN ON THE STREET 1: [translated] I am with you, Chávez.
MAN ON THE STREET 2: [translated] Hello, President.
OLIVER STONE : But no matter what you believe, in South America he is just the beginning.
GEORGE TENET : Venezuela is important because they&#8217;re the third largest supplier of petroleum.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] Bush made a plan: first, Chávez, oil; second, Saddam, Iraq, oil.
PRESIDENT CRISTINA KIRCHNER : [translated] For the first time in the region, the leaders look like the people they govern. If you go to Bolivia and look at the face of Evo, the face of Evo is the face of a Bolivian.
OLIVER STONE : Could we say the goal of presidents of the region would be to own their own natural resources?
PRESIDENT LUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA : [translated] The only thing I want is to be treated as equals. I personally have no interest in fighting with the United States.
OLIVER STONE : Rafael Correa is now being cast as one of the bad left.
PRESIDENT RAFAEL CORREA : [translated] With all due respect, knowing the North American media, I would be more worried if they spoke well of me.
REPORTER : Today, the Argentinian president, with concern about US trade policy, seemed in no hurry to embrace his American counterpart.
NÉSTOR KIRCHNER : [translated] Bush told me the best way to revitalize the economy is war and that the United States has grown stronger with war. Those were his exact words.
NARRATOR : This summer, take an incredible look at an extraordinary movement.
PRESIDENT LUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA : [translated] For the first time, the poor are treated like human beings.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] And perhaps this is one of the things that keeps us going &mdash; the optimism, faith and hope, and the concrete evidence that we can change the course of history. It&#8217;s possible, Oliver.
NARRATOR : South of the Border .
OLIVER STONE : I&#8217;m just curious. How many sets of shoes do you have?
PRESIDENT CRISTINA KIRCHNER : [translated] They always ask questions like this to women. I don&#8217;t get it. They never ask a man how many pairs of shoes he has.
AMY GOODMAN : And that was the trailer for Oliver Stone&#8217;s South of the Border . It&#8217;s being released this week in New York. South of the Border &mdash; the leftist transformation in the region might be ignored or misrepresented as nothing but anti-Americanism in the mainstream media, but the film seeks to tell a different story &mdash; released in Latin America earlier this month, opening here in the United States this week.
Award-winning director Oliver Stone joins us here in New York. And we&#8217;re joined by the acclaimed writer and activist Tariq Ali. He co-wrote the screenplay for South of Border with Mark Weisbrot.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Oliver Stone, welcome for the first time to Democracy Now!
OLIVER STONE : Thank you, Amy.
AMY GOODMAN : It&#8217;s good to have you here. Talk about why you chose to make this film.
OLIVER STONE : It chose me. I do feature films most of the time, but I do &mdash; I&#8217;ve done six documentaries and work &mdash; this is my fourth one. And it gets right to the point. You know, with a film, you take a year. It&#8217;s a lot of money. It&#8217;s a lot of actors, costumes, scripts. This is a much simpler way of going about it, and it keeps you humble. It keeps you in the field.
I&#8217;ve been going down to South America off and on for twenty years. I did Salvador there in 1985 with &mdash; about the Central America situation. I was shocked, what I saw. I just &mdash; I had been back from Vietnam for about fifteen years at that point, and I saw all these American soldiers down in Honduras, you know, fighting against the Nicaraguan government. I saw them in Salvador, and I saw them in &mdash; a form of them &mdash;- in Costa Rica. I was shocked. And from that thing, I went back and saw Chiapas. I saw Commander Marcos. I rode with him a bit in the jungle. And then I went down there to Cuba. I had problems with Cuba, because my films were censored here. They were not shown. One of them was not shown; Comandante was taken off the air. It was shown in Europe. And then, so, Chávez -&mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Where wasn&#8217;t it shown?
OLIVER STONE : It was not shown on HBO . It was pulled from HBO . It was promoed, and then it was taken off the air two weeks before.
AMY GOODMAN : Why?
OLIVER STONE : Because that was after 9 &mdash; it was after that sort of that mindset of post-9/11, you know? There was a lot of hysteria in the air, and Castro had just arrested hijackers. They&#8217;d been in confrontation with Bush. So HBO kindly told me, you know, &quot;We&#8217;d like you to complete the film and go back and ask him some other questions.&quot; I said, &quot;No, this is my film. This is the way it&#8217;s finished. I&#8217;ll go back, and I&#8217;ll do another film called Looking for Fidel ,&quot; which we ended up doing. So I asked him a lot of hard questions on Looking for Fidel , which was aired. But they never aired the &mdash; it&#8217;s a heartbreaking story for me, personally, as a filmmaker, because I really put a lot of effort into it. It&#8217;s a ninety-minute film. It&#8217;s played all over the world, except here.
So, Chávez was sort of a natural, because he was such a demonized, polarizing figure. But when I met him, he was not at all what I thought, you know, what we made him out to be. So I went on from talking to Hugo. He suggested, you know, &quot;Go talk to other people in the region. You know, don&#8217;t believe me necessarily.&quot; So we went around, and we talked to seven other &mdash; eight other presidents &mdash; or seven other presidents in six countries. And we got this amazing unity in referendum saying, like, hey, these guys are changing the way Latin America is, and we don&#8217;t know this story in America, when you think about it, except Peru and Mexico &mdash; well, Peru and Colombia really are the two American allies in the region. So what struck me as a news, as something that&#8217;s historic, is that I&#8217;ve never seen these countries in South America, in a sense, unified by an idea of reform at the same time, because in the past, when Chile or Argentina or Brazil happened, we picked off the reformers one at a time, because they only happened &mdash; they didn&#8217;t happen in a unity. And this is the first time I&#8217;ve seen that since &mdash; what, since Bolívar, maybe. We haven&#8217;t &mdash; you know, going back to 1820s.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Well, what struck me also was, I think, the way you were able not only to present their viewpoints, in terms of how they saw the changes in Latin America, but also humanizing them, because for an American audience, the image of Hugo Chávez, of this firebrand, and then you have him on a bicycle in his &mdash; riding around in the yard of his former home, breaking the bicycle. And then &mdash;-
OLIVER STONE : Yeah.
JUAN GONZALEZ : I thought the most comic line in the whole film was when, after breaking the bicycle, he says, in Spanish, &quot;Whose bicycle is this? I guess I&#8217;m going to have to pay for it.&quot;
OLIVER STONE : He&#8217;s not rich. His father is not rich, and he was also a military man. And he comes from a poor family. And he is what he is. He works for the people. I&#8217;ve never seen a man work so hard. I mean, he really cares. So do all of them, by the way. Every single one of them I met was elected duly, democratically, which Americans don&#8217;t know. And they serve the people, unlike a lot of the oligarchs and dictators who ruled prior and we supported. But we&#8217;re against these people. That&#8217;s what amazes me. Why is our -&mdash; what is it about America that makes &mdash; needs enemies and makes enemies out of these people who are reformers in their country? Whether it&#8217;s Allende or the people in Argentina or Brazil, or Torrijos in Panama, or &mdash; the list is long. You know, why? Nicaragua.
JUAN GONZALEZ : You also center in on the IMF and the role of the IMF , which, again, most Americans know little about the operations of the IMF around the world. Yet, in most other countries in the world, the IMF is well known.
OLIVER STONE : Mark Weisbrot is with the Center of Economic Policy and Research, and he&#8217;s a co-founder of that, and he brought that element into this. It&#8217;s very important. And obviously Americans don&#8217;t care about economics as much; it&#8217;s hard to follow. But Mark points out that in the 1990s, there was about $20 billion in loans from the IMF to Latin America. Now there&#8217;s about a billion, which is interesting. They got rid of it, as Kirchner, Néstor Kirchner of Argentina, is a real hero here. He did technically default on the IMF , but then he paid them off. And he defaulted on the corporate bonds, which was a big scandal, but yet Argentine economy, which was predicted to be a disaster, improved radically. So did Chávez&#8217;s economy for six years. I think the gross national product went 90 percent up, up 90 percent. Poverty was cut in half. So all these changes in all these countries have been positive since the IMF is out. They don&#8217;t want our money. They don&#8217;t want the loans. It&#8217;s important.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to go right now to a clip of Hugo Chávez talking about oil.
OLIVER STONE : Chávez&#8217;s reforms provoked fierce resistance from the country&#8217;s oligarchy.
OLIGARCHY MEMBER : We have a government that lies. They&#8217;re all a bunch of liars.
OLIVER STONE : They control the Venezuelan media and used it to foment opposition. They also mobilized support within the military and received help from the United States and Spain.
GEN . CAMACHO KAIRUZ : [translated] I think the most reasonable thing for the President and his cabinet to do is resign voluntarily or disappear from the country.
OLIVER STONE : A businessman, Pedro Carmona, was chosen to be the new president. He supposedly flew to Madrid to be measured for a presidential sash.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The coup against Chávez had one motive: oil. Bush made a plan: first, Chávez, oil; second, Saddam, Iraq. The reason behind the coup in Venezuela and the invasion of Iraq is the same: oil.
AMY GOODMAN : That was Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez. Oliver Stone, talk about how the US media portrays Chávez.
OLIVER STONE : Well, all you have to do is go to YouTube, and you&#8217;ll see. I mean, we put in the movie, it&#8217;s hysterical and outrageous. And by the way, mainstream &mdash; Washington Post , New York Times &mdash; it&#8217;s awful. I mean, it&#8217;s almost as if the New York Times guy &mdash; Simon Romero is his name &mdash; he sits there for years, and he&#8217;s a sniper. He doesn&#8217;t say one positive thing. It&#8217;s like every week or two he has to file his story, make it negative. It seems like that&#8217;s a directive. And he goes out &mdash; I mean, you read this stuff. All of it &mdash; and he never goes to the other side. He never gets the other side of the story. And he gets very complex little incidents, and he builds it up into this madhouse. It seems like it&#8217;s Chile again, like Allende. It&#8217;s like the economy is crashing. And the contrary is true. I mean, it&#8217;s a very rich country. It&#8217;s a regional power. It&#8217;s got, apparently, $500 billion &mdash; 5,000 billion barrels of oil in reserve. It&#8217;s a major player for the rest of our time on earth, as long as we go with oil. You know, they&#8217;re not going to go away. So, Brazil and Venezuela.
And that raises a whole interesting thing about what recently happened in Iran, you know, when Lula from Brazil went over there with Turkey, Erdogan. That was a very interesting moment for me and for Tariq, because I grew up in the &#39;50s, so did he, and we remember the neutral bloc, remember the &mdash; remember Nehru and Nasser and Sukarno and fellow in Cambodia.
TARIQ ALI : Sihanouk
OLIVER STONE : Sihanouk. I mean, there was a bloc of people who used to say, &quot;Hey, this is what we want. This is not what the United States wants.&quot; And they were a mediator, a third rail between the Soviets and us. That&#39;s gone in the world, and people don&#8217;t seem to realize it who are growing up. So when Lula did that, I couldn&#8217;t believe the outrage by people like Tom Friedman attacking him. And it was disgusting, I thought, really disgusting, because he never presented the point of view of Brazil and Turkey, which are major countries, huge powers, regional powers.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And the New York Times , of course, before that trip, was blasting the possibility of Lula being able to negotiate any kind of arrangement and basically saying he was naive, he was out of his league. And Tariq, your response? The impact of that deal that was brokered by Turkey and &mdash;-
TARIQ ALI : Look, I mean, everyone was surprised in the West, that how dare these countries have the nerve to go over our heads and negotiate an independent deal with Iran. But this is what the world once used to be like. No one accepted US hegemony unquestioningly, as many of the Security Council members do. The other point is that Brazil was very courageous to do this, Lula particularly, because Brazil has been trying to get a Security -&mdash; permanent Security Council seat for a long time, and they&#8217;ve now jeopardized that process. They will never be allowed it. So they did it for good principled reasons, showing the world Iran is prepared to do a deal; it&#8217;s you who don&#8217;t want to do it, because you&#8217;re permanently under pressure from Israel.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to go to break and then come back. Our guests are Tariq Ali &mdash; he co-wrote South of the Border &mdash; Oliver Stone is the Oscar award-winning director and screenwriter. His latest film is South of the Border , and he also has Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps coming out. That&#8217;s Wall Street 2 . Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : We are talking to Oliver Stone, who has done this new film that&#8217;s coming out this week in the United States called South of the Border . Tariq Ali co-wrote South of the Border . And we want to turn to the Brazilian president, Lula da Silva, talking about Brazil.
PRESIDENT LUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA : [translated] I learned as a trade unionist that one only respects someone who respects themselves. I personally have no interest in fighting with the United States. The only thing I want is to be treated as equals. When I met with the head of the IMF and paid off the debt in full, he did not want me to pay the debt. He said, &quot;Don&#8217;t worry about the money. We can roll it over. Keep the money.&quot; We paid off the IMF . We paid off the Paris Club. We do not owe anything to anybody. And now we have $260 billion surplus. I am truly optimistic.
AMY GOODMAN : That was Lula da Silva, the Brazilian president. Oliver Stone uses the clips to talk to us. Now we&#8217;re going to say that right on the air, what you&#8217;re saying about Lula da Silva, about Chávez, and now they&#8217;re covered and how they&#8217;re censored in various ways.
OLIVER STONE : You go.
TARIQ ALI : Well &mdash;-
AMY GOODMAN : Tariq Ali?
TARIQ ALI : Why? Why does this happen? That&#8217;s the question we have to ask. Why are these people so hated by the mainstream media in the United States? And the answer is simple: that they present an alternative. What they&#8217;re doing is using their wealth, especially the oil wealth of Venezuela, to bail out the poor. Here, it&#8217;s the rich who are bailed out by taxpayers&#8217; money. In South America, it&#8217;s the poor who are bailed out by the wealth, which they regard as owned commonly by the people.
And they were the first countries to attack neoliberal economics, which collapsed in Wall Street in 2008. The whole Wall Street system collapsed. These guys had been doing it for ten, fifteen years previously. So none of them were surprised by the Wall Street crash, because of what they&#8217;d been doing. So we should look at them as pioneers. Hey guys, you were the ones who taught us that this could happen in Argentina, in Venezuela, and later Brazil, Ecuador.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And Oliver Stone, we&#8217;re going to play a clip, when you were interviewing Néstor Kirchner. And you see him as a real hero in this, even within the pantheon of these leaders, because he actually stood up directly to George Bush at a summit, an important summit a few years back in Argentina, over this issue of neoliberalism.
OLIVER STONE : Yeah, not only him, but he&#8217;s also now the president of UNASUR , which is the union of these countries. This is a new deal. And it&#8217;s not just him, but he led -&mdash; he was the first one to say no to the Western neoliberal economics. And he actually was &mdash; they were predicting disaster. There had been like four or five Argentine presidents right before him, one after another. And he lasted. And he brought the country out of this horrifying cycle, and it prospered enormously, up until recently, with the &mdash; the world recession has put some of these countries, no question.
JUAN GONZALEZ : But let&#8217;s take a look at that clip of Kirchner.
OLIVER STONE : Were there any eye-to-eye moments with President Bush that day, that night?
NÉSTOR KIRCHNER : [translated] I say it&#8217;s not necessary to kneel before power. Nor do you need to be rude to say the things you have to say to those who oppose our actions. We had a discussion in Monterey. I said that a solution to the problems right now, I told Bush, is a Marshall Plan. And he got angry. He said the Marshall Plan is a crazy idea of the Democrats. He said the best way to revitalize the economy is war and that the United States has grown stronger with war.
OLIVER STONE : War. He said that?
NÉSTOR KIRCHNER : [translated] He said that. Those were his exact words.
OLIVER STONE : Was he suggesting that South America go to war?
NÉSTOR KIRCHNER : [translated] Well, he was talking about the United States. The Democrats had been wrong. All of the economic growth of the United States has been encouraged by the various wars. He said it very clearly. President Bush is &mdash; well, he&#8217;s only got six days left, right?
OLIVER STONE : Yes.
NÉSTOR KIRCHNER : [translated] Thank God.
JUAN GONZALEZ : That was former President Kirchner. And these comments of President Bush that he says about the United States growing strong through war, I don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s ever been reported anywhere.
OLIVER STONE : Well, it goes to the heart of the issue. And, you know, we know it, but we sound jaded when we say it. But why do we all &mdash; why does America go to war? I went to Vietnam. We went &mdash; right after that, we didn&#8217;t &mdash; I made three movies about it. And then we went back to Panama. We invaded Panama, Grenada, then we went into Iraq twice and now Afghanistan. I don&#8217;t get it. And there has to be a reason for all this corporate march to war. Why do &mdash; and the press supports it. And we saw it in Iraq most vividly. It was very depressing to be a Vietnam veteran at that time. And now we&#8217;re seeing it again with Iran and with Afghanistan, the support of this war. I don&#8217;t &mdash; there&#8217;s no sense to it, because we don&#8217;t resemble the Afghani or the Vietnam average person. Our soldiers have to go. If they&#8217;re going to go there, they&#8217;ve got to stay. That&#8217;s all there is to it. They&#8217;ve got to become citizens of Afghanistan. That&#8217;s the only way they&#8217;re ever going to make it. They&#8217;re not. There&#8217;s no way we&#8217;re going to say, and they know it. And as long as they know we&#8217;re leaving, I don&#8217;t see any victory, any exit, any exit strategy at all.
AMY GOODMAN : Let&#8217;s go, since you talked about your time in Vietnam, to one of your most well-known films, a clip of Platoon .
SGT . BARNES : What about the [bleep] rice and the weapons? Who are they for? A VC? That [bleep] knows what I&#8217;m saying. He understands. Don&#8217;t you, pop?
ACE : Goddamn right, he does.
SGT . BARNES : [inaudible]
JUNIOR : He&#8217;s lying through his teeth! Come on!
TONY : Waste the [bleep], then see who talks.
SGT . BARNES : VC! Where&#8217;s VC?
LERNER : He doesn&#8217;t know anything.
VIETNAMESE VILLAGE WOMAN : [speaking Vietnamese]
LERNER : He swears he doesn&#8217;t know anything. He hates the NVA , but they come when they want, and they just take the place over.
SGT . BARNES : What&#8217;s the [bleep] saying?
LERNER : I don&#8217;t know. She&#8217;s going on about why are we killing the pigs, their farmers. They&#8217;ve got to make a living. All that kind of [bleep].
SGT . BARNES : Jeez!
SOLDIER : Shut up!
SGT . BARNES : [shoots village woman] You tell him he starts talking, or I&#8217;m going to waste more of them. Tell him, Lerner!
LERNER : [speaking Vietnamese]
VIETNAMESE VILLAGE MAN : [speaking Vietnamese]
ACE : Sir, let us in on this, alright?
AMY GOODMAN : A scene from Platoon .
OLIVER STONE : Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN : Oliver Stone.
OLIVER STONE : I don&#8217;t get it. I think &mdash; I mean, we trashed Vietnam, I mean, completely. We didn&#8217;t even recognize it for so many years after the war. We did the same thing to Iraq. I wouldn&#8217;t want to live in Iraq. I mean, they call it democracy? That&#8217;s not democracy. It&#8217;s the same thing over and over. Why? Why does &mdash; I see all the &mdash; I don&#8217;t watch TV as much as a lot of people, but what I see is people all get on the air, they talk about our discretionary spending, they talk about the Tea Party people, they talk about education, cutting this, this &mdash; I don&#8217;t get it. Why, if the majority of our discretionary spending is Pentagon &mdash; it&#8217;s like a trillion dollars, with a shadow budget in there, a trillion dollars a year, that&#8217;s most of the discretionary spending in this country &mdash; why is it going to war? If we&#8217;re in such bad shape, why are we not taking care of ourselves? Why is Obama embracing this?
And why is Clinton down in Latin America, when I&#8217;m there, trying to separate these countries? And we&#8217;re still doing the same thing. We&#8217;re trying to divide one country from the other. She goes to Bolivia &mdash; she goes to Ecuador. She goes to Argentina. She tries to separate them. She&#8217;s trying to pull Brazil away from Venezuela. It doesn&#8217;t work. They&#8217;re together in this. This is the first time &mdash; I repeat, Amy &mdash; the first time in our lifetime that I&#8217;ve seen these so many countries in Latin America together, with the exception of Peru and Colombia.
AMY GOODMAN : And we&#8217;re going to talk about Colombia in a minute, but Juan?
JUAN GONZALEZ : Well, on this issue of war and, of course, the statement that President Bush made, which to me was startling, is, in essence, when our government goes to war, not only does it spend huge amounts of money that it turns over to the contractors who assist the war, but also technological development always increases sharply, sponsored by the government. And then, after the war, these same companies then use the new technological development to open up new arenas of business. So, in that sense, I think Bush was talking about how war &mdash;-
OLIVER STONE : Yeah.
JUAN GONZALEZ : &mdash;- forces the productive forces ahead and allows capitalism to continue to exploit.
OLIVER STONE : It&#8217;s a hard way to die.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Tariq?
TARIQ ALI : Well, no, that &mdash; he was very honest. The thing is that Bush used to spell it out straight, which is why people didn&#8217;t like him that much, because he just said it. I mean, often what he said was true from his point of view, and from the point of view of the corporations. He didn&#8217;t wear a mask. He didn&#8217;t use emollient words, which is what happens now.
But the other thing I was thinking, as we were just seeing that clip from Platoon , is, why isn&#8217;t there a movie like that about Iraq now? I mean, quite a lot of the movies we are seeing, the Iraqis don&#8217;t appear. And yet, we know what has been done to Iraq: a million have died. A million Iraqis have died since the occupation. But we don&#8217;t really get a glimpse of them. So the enemy is dehumanized, or that they&#8217;re all Muslims and so it doesn&#8217;t matter if we kill them &mdash; after all, they did 9/11. And all this rubbish that goes on endlessly to misinform the public, that&#8217;s what we&#8217;re seeing.
AMY GOODMAN : Before you leave, Oliver Stone, I wanted to ask you about the sequel you&#8217;ve made to your hit Wall Street . It&#8217;s called Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps . This is a famous clip from the original Wall Street , featuring Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko.
GORDON GEKKO : Point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms &mdash; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge &mdash; has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed &mdash; you mark my words &mdash; will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA . Thank you very much.
AMY GOODMAN : So, is Gordon Gekko making another appearance?
OLIVER STONE : The film is, you know, a visit to another planet. It&#8217;s twenty-three years later, that Wall Street has become worse. We know that. I mean, millions of dollars have become billions of dollars. The currency is now completely inflated. And the values are the same. The bank &mdash; but the big difference is the banks are doing it now. I mean, it&#8217;s not the hedge funds, it&#8217;s the banks. And they overloaded, and we all overloaded, but the banks led the charge, and the government allowed it to happen. But we know the story. I don&#8217;t want to go there.
The movie is a movie, and it&#8217;s fun, and it&#8217;s got five people in it who are &mdash; it&#8217;s a triangle, essentially, between Gordon and his daughter, Carey Mulligan, and her fiancé, Shia LaBeouf. And Josh Brolin and Frank Langella play mentors to Shia LaBeouf. It&#8217;s a fun movie, but, you know &mdash; and in that transaction, you come to this &mdash; for me, what&#8217;s the essential question: what is your life about? Is it going to be about money, or is it going to be about love? Is it going to be about family values and things that matter, human values, or is it about money?
It&#8217;s like South America. It&#8217;s the same thing. And the Wall Street guys, I mean, the big guys, you know, they&#8217;re part of the IMF , International Monetary Fund. They&#8217;re part of the whole deal, which is, make loans to people, get them on the hook, get them into &mdash; they&#8217;re drug addicts &mdash; keep them to be drug addicts, keep people stupid, and make money. Nothing has changed since my father&#8217;s day, and he started in 1930s.
AMY GOODMAN : And what did he do?
OLIVER STONE : He was a broker.
AMY GOODMAN : So, Wall Street , you thought, was a warning to people.
OLIVER STONE : Yeah, yeah.
AMY GOODMAN : And yet you attracted people to Wall Street.
OLIVER STONE : It was a melodrama about financial movies, which had not been made in this country. As he said, why don&#8217;t they make a movie about Iraq? They were not making any movies about financial situation. Now they have it wall to wall on TV. I&#8217;m glad, but it&#8217;s not really dealing with the fundamental issues. It&#8217;s about the surface: who&#8217;s making money, who isn&#8217;t, right? Who&#8217;s a big star, who isn&#8217;t? All these CEOs make the magazine covers. I think that&#8217;s pretty vile, considering that in the old days, when I grew up, if you had a lot of money, like John Rockefeller, you kind of like hid. You know, you always tried to do &mdash; tried to stay low-key. But now it&#8217;s gotten insane. There&#8217;s a scene in the movie with a thousand billionaires are listed. A thousand billionaires &mdash; can you imagine that? You grew up when, what, there were four or five billionaires in the world. It&#8217;s unfortunate.
But it ties into the whole thing. It&#8217;s organic. Latin America comes from Wall Street, too. Wall Street, you know, you could say &mdash; I&#8217;m sure Tariq could make a better argument &mdash; runs the world. Wall Street, the pharmaceutical lobbies, the oil lobbies, they run our government. We should consider, in the wake of this spill, perhaps doing something about nationalizing our own government and trying to get the profits back to the people, because Latin America has shown us that they care about the people more than the profits. And they&#8217;ve done well with the people. We haven&#8217;t.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And through all of these films now that you&#8217;ve made over decades, the overriding message that ties them together in terms of what your artistic vision is?
OLIVER STONE : Well, I believe in &mdash; movies have to be fun. You&#8217;ve got to go and have a &mdash; you know, if you can take the JFK story and make it exciting, I mean, that may be not &mdash; that&#8217;s good. I mean, it makes people interested. A new generation looks at it. Wall Street &#39;s the same thing. It makes them interested in what&#39;s going on in the world. That&#8217;s all I can do. Documentaries is another form of filmmaking.
AMY GOODMAN : The five million-dollar question on JFK today, your thoughts on his assassination?
OLIVER STONE : Listen, I think JFK is a much-maligned president, but I think he really changed in 1963. I stick to the &mdash; and, by the way, James Douglas has a new book. McGeorge Bundy came out recently. Gordon Goldstein, I believe is the name, wrote a wonderful book about Bundy. He said I was all wrong. Kennedy wanted to pull out. He confirms what McNamara said. In &#39;63, Kennedy wanted out of Vietnam. He wanted to make a deal with Cuba, with Castro. And he wanted &mdash; he certainly &mdash; the most important thing was he had a détente going with Khrushchev. All these things ended when he was shot. And Johnson, whatever they say, went the other way completely, 180 degrees.
AMY GOODMAN : And who you think killed him?
OLIVER STONE : The motive is in that answer.
AMY GOODMAN : Well, I want to thank you very much for being with us, Oliver Stone. Tariq, you&#39;re going to stay with us. Tariq Ali &mdash;-
OLIVER STONE : Thank you, Amy, thank you, Juan, for having me. I&#8217;d love to come back some day.
AMY GOODMAN : Thank you so much, and good luck with South of the Border .
OLIVER STONE : Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, the War and Peace Report. We&#8217;ll be back in a minute.
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AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re staying with Tariq Ali. He&#8217;s a well-known writer and activist, co-wrote South of the Border , Oliver Stone&#8217;s film that&#8217;s opening this week. And we want to stay on this film. We want to go to Ecuador, to Oliver Stone speaking with Ecuador&#8217;s president Rafael Correa.
OLIVER STONE : Where are you with the United States?
PRESIDENT RAFAEL CORREA : [translated] We love the United States very much. I lived there. I studied there. We love the people of the United States very much. But obviously, the US foreign policy is questionable. That&#8217;s why when they want to pressure us to maintain their military base in our country, a foreign base that they don&#8217;t pay anything for, either, and they accuse us of being extremists because we don&#8217;t want the base -&mdash; if there&#8217;s no problem having foreign military bases in a country, we set a very specific condition: we would keep the North American base in Manta, provided they let us put a military base in Miami. If there&#8217;s no problem with foreign bases, then we should be able to have one over there.
AMY GOODMAN : That&#8217;s the Ecuadoran president Rafael Correa. Tariq Ali?
TARIQ ALI : Well, I mean, you know, what can one say? He says, &quot;When the American media attacks me, I know I&#8217;m doing right.&quot; And that is a view which large numbers of South American leaders have now. The fact that they are traduced, denounced in the mainstream media in this country doesn&#8217;t bother them so much. You know, Hugo Chávez says if the New York Times started supporting me, I would be very surprised. So, outside the United States, and probably for large numbers of people inside it, as well, the media is now a central pillar of the needs of the state and the government and what it does. I mean, that whole thing during the Cold War, when diversity and diverse voices were allowed on the networks and in the press, that&#8217;s gone now. They&#8217;re very blatant about it. And no one takes it too seriously. I mean, it&#8217;s irritating, and sometimes it&#8217;s slanderous, but it&#8217;s not a surprise.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Well, Tariq, I&#8217;d like to ask you, because you were there when a lot of these interviews were conducted with these various presidents. And obviously, while they&#8217;re all united around a new independent role, they have considerable differences among themselves, in terms of what are the proper approaches or strategies on a variety of issues, certainly between Lula and Hugo Chávez or the Kirchners. Could you talk about that some?
TARIQ ALI : Well, I think you&#8217;re absolutely right, Juan. I mean, Lula&#8217;s economic policies are very different from those of Chávez and Morales. He decided soon after he came to power that he couldn&#8217;t basically dismantle the neoliberal system. It was too much, and he thought it was safer to go that way. So, essentially what they did was a few cosmetic things, not unimportant, by giving subsidies to the poor, which is important, but they didn&#8217;t touch the system. And I think that has been a problem for some of his supporters. However, in terms of foreign policy, Lula made a big break. He said Brazil will no longer be used to demobilize countries like Venezuela or Bolivia. We will not participate in destabilizing them, in demobilizing those people. And he told that very clearly to the United States. Don&#8217;t even try and do it. I don&#8217;t necessarily agree with everything that these people do, but it&#8217;s their right to do it. And that, for South America, marks a big leap forward.
AMY GOODMAN : Talk about what happened in Colombia, the election.
TARIQ ALI : Well, I mean, Colombia, it&#8217;s just now beyond a joke, really. It was bound to happen. Uribe couldn&#8217;t stand again, for constitutional reasons, and he&#8217;s put in his minister. The guy largely responsible for the repression, the guy largely responsible for supervising some of the death squads, the guy totally in the pocket of the US embassy, is now president of Colombia. Colombia is the big US base in South America now. Peru, to a lesser extent. Colombia is the big base. This is where money is being poured in. This is where US military bases are being built. And Correa recently, the president of Ecuador, made it very clear. He said to the Colombians, if your troops ever come into our country again, like you did once before, for whatever the reason, we are going to fight back, so don&#8217;t do it. And this is from Correa, who is regarded by the State Department here as the more reasonable of the Bolivarian leaders. He is warning the Colombians about this. So Hillary Clinton&#8217;s trip to try and divide them from each other really backfired. It&#8217;s not going to work, because South America has changed.
AMY GOODMAN : The new foreign &mdash; the new president of Colombia will be the former defense minister, Juan Manuel Santos.
TARIQ ALI : Yeah.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And, of course, in the film, you deal with all of the new presidents, but then you go back to Raúl Castro of Cuba and one of the, I think, first interviews that Americans have seen of Raúl Castro after he replaced Fidel as the president of Cuba. Let&#8217;s go to that clip.
PRESIDENT RAÚL CASTRO : [translated] The Cubans are the heirs of the liberators of the Americas, starting with Bolívar, Sucre, Toussaint L&#8217;ouverture, the Haitian, the first and only successful revolution led by slaves in the history of the world. We are the heirs of some of the more recent battles of other companions who have fallen, like Che Guevara. Now some are young, like President Correa and President Chávez. But each one is learning their own identity and finding their own identity within the continent.
AMY GOODMAN : That was Raúl Castro. And by the way, Tariq Ali has written the book Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope , about Evo Morales, Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez. So what do you think of Raúl Castro and where Fidel Castro fits into this picture?
TARIQ ALI : Well, Fidel was, you know, I mean, an iconic leader, still is. And even people in South America who hate him know that he is one of those figures produced in South American history once or twice maybe in a hundred years. So that will never go.
The interesting thing now is what will happen in Cuba. And this is literally a million-dollar question. Which way are they going to go? The US has certainly not made any conciliatory moves, though there were a lot of hopes that Obama would do it. But as in every other thing, the continuities between Obama and the Bush administration are more striking than any breach. So, the Cubans could go the Chinese route, keeping the party in power, opening up the economy. It&#8217;s very difficult to find out, penetrate what is being discussed at the upper levels.
However, what is not difficult to see is that the Cuban social services &mdash; their medicine, their education &mdash; is now helping the whole of South America, Amy. It&#8217;s quite &mdash; you know, this is what is very noticeable, that you have Cuban doctors now in most South American countries, helping the poor, setting up clinics, and often going to, you know, parts of Africa, as well, and doing the same thing, and training people. And the Cuban medical university has got people from all over, including hundreds and hundreds of Venezuelan kids from poor families. I remember when I was in Havana, and they took me to the school. And there were some Afro-American kids from the United States learning to be medical students. And I said, &quot;How do you guys find it here?&quot; And they said, &quot;We&#8217;ve never known anything like this before. We would never be able to get this education in our own country.&quot; And the government here was aware of it, because Colin Powell exempted these students from the boycott. So they know that what the United States can&#8217;t do, this tiny little island is doing.
So there are lots of good things to be understood and learned about Cuba, which, I mean, I&#8217;ve always said that the Cubans and the Venezuelans could learn a lot from each other. The Venezuelans could learn on how to produce a social infrastructure that serves the people, and the Cubans could learn that having critical voices in a country is not always harmful. It keeps you on your toes, and it makes you more alert.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Let&#8217;s go to a clip from Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo from the film.
PRESIDENT FERNANDO LUGO : [translated] It hasn&#8217;t been easy to create change in this country. Here, there&#8217;s a group which has historically been privileged in the government with the country&#8217;s resources. We want to be consistent with the theory of liberation theology. If there are going to be the privileged, then it has to be those who in the past have been forgotten: the indigenous, the landless, the uneducated, the sick. Those are the ones who need to be the first priority. We are committed to honesty, transparency, and to give back dignity to our institutions, and with much more social justice.
AMY GOODMAN : The Paraguayan president Lugo. The significance of this priest-turned-president?
TARIQ ALI : Well, the significance is that Paraguay is a country which has essentially been a one-party state for so long that people forgot when it was anything else. And the stranglehold of this party and the country&#8217;s rich prevented anything from coming up. And then you have this priest, you know, a bishop who sort of was later discarded his bishop&#8217;s frocks, leading the people, fighting for the poor, and actually winning an election.
And I think one reason that happened is because of the changes taking place elsewhere in South America. I remember I was giving a talk in Porto Alegre at one of the World Social Forums, and sitting in the sixth row somewhere was this priest from Paraguay, which was Lugo. And later on, he told a friend of mine, &quot;Oh, I know him. I heard him speak at Porto Alegre.&quot; So, the mixture that was South America helped propel him to power. And people felt confident. They think, if they can do it in other parts of South America, why can&#8217;t we? So he was an incredibly popular figure. And as I must say, the scale of his victory stunned us, because we thought they might rig the elections or do something. But the mood was so overwhelming and the number of poor who turned up to vote was so huge that they couldn&#8217;t do it. So it goes to show that the collective spirit of South America, which we haven&#8217;t seen for a very long time, which the Cubans in the &#39;60s and &#8217;70s were hoping for, you know, OLAS and this and that, is now coming to fruition. For how long, we don&#39;t know. But &#39;til now, the US hasn&#39;t been able to turn that tide back. And with allies like Colombia, it is very unlikely that they will. And had they not rigged the elections in Mexico, we would have had a different president there, too.
AMY GOODMAN : Before you leave us, Tariq, we wanted to go to another continent. We wanted to talk about Afghanistan and Pakistan. You are from Pakistan.
TARIQ ALI : Mm-hmm.
AMY GOODMAN : Your latest book is on Pakistan &mdash; you&#8217;ve written many &mdash; the book called The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power . What do you think of Obama&#8217;s war now in Afghanistan and what&#8217;s happening in Pakistan?
TARIQ ALI : Look, if you look at Obama, that on all the other foreign policy shows he basically continued with Bush&#8217;s policies. Let&#8217;s be blunt about this. In Afghanistan, he went beyond Bush. He escalated the war. He went along with this policy of the surge. And he ordered more drone attacks on civilians in Pakistan in his one year in office than Bush had done during his last term. So, for the people of that region, Obama&#8217;s presidency has been a total disaster. And it&#8217;s not working. If you read the reports coming out of Afghanistan, they&#8217;re losing more people. There are more casualties. More Afghan civilians are being killed. They have a puppet leader, Karzai, who&#8217;s developing his own sort of dynamic, because he&#8217;s grown very wealthy through corruption and thinks that he has genuine support. Puppets sometimes have these illusions. And he can&#8217;t be got rid of, because they&#8217;ve got no one to replace him. So they are really stuck in Afghanistan. And if &mdash; and they&#8217;re deficient, as we know, within the US military-political establishment on this war. And the ones who are saying that this is an unwinnable war are absolutely right. It&#8217;s a stalemated war. They can&#8217;t win it unless they destroy half the population of the country.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And the impact on Pakistan of the continued drone attacks and the continued secret war going on in Pakistan?
TARIQ ALI : Well, this is it. They&#8217;ve been &mdash; the drones have been killing civilians. I mean, I point out that the day that the tragedy happened in Tehran and that young woman Nehda was killed &mdash; accidentally, it so happens, but she was killed, which was terrible and a tragedy &mdash; we had a moist-eyed president in the White House talking to the media on what a terrible tragedy that was, and the same day, a drone attack in Pakistan killed fifteen innocents, mainly women and children, who didn&#8217;t even make it onto the news bulletins. So that is what people see. And then, why are they surprised that people are so hostile to the United States in that part of the world?
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;ll have to leave it there, Tariq Ali, British Pakistani political commentator, historian, activist, filmmaker. He co-wrote the screenplay South of the Border . His latest book, The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power . JUANGONZALEZ: Today we spend the hour south of the border on the political changes that are sweeping across South America.

Academy Award-winning filmmaker Oliver Stone has taken on three American presidents in JFK, Nixon and W. A Vietnam War veteran, he was decorated with a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart. As a filmmaker, he’s tackled the most controversial aspects of the war in his classics Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July. He looked at the greed of the financial industry in the Hollywood hit Wall Street, and the sequel, Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last month.

Well, now the acclaimed director of films like Salvador, Comandante and Looking for Fidel, returns to Latin America. In his latest film, releasing this week in the United States, Oliver Stone takes a road trip across South America, meeting with seven presidents from the continent. Here’s the trailer. It includes Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, Argentine president Cristina Kirchner and her husband, former president Néstor Kirchner, Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa.

OLIVERSTONE: Who is Hugo Chávez? Some believe he is the enemy

JOHNROBERTS, CNN: He’s more dangerous than bin Laden. And the effects of Chávez’s war against America could eclipse those of 9/11.

OLIVERSTONE: Some believe he is the answer.

MAN ON THESTREET 1: [translated] I am with you, Chávez.

MAN ON THESTREET 2: [translated] Hello, President.

OLIVERSTONE: But no matter what you believe, in South America he is just the beginning.

GEORGETENET: Venezuela is important because they’re the third largest supplier of petroleum.

PRESIDENTCRISTINAKIRCHNER: [translated] For the first time in the region, the leaders look like the people they govern. If you go to Bolivia and look at the face of Evo, the face of Evo is the face of a Bolivian.

OLIVERSTONE: Could we say the goal of presidents of the region would be to own their own natural resources?

PRESIDENTLUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA: [translated] The only thing I want is to be treated as equals. I personally have no interest in fighting with the United States.

OLIVERSTONE: Rafael Correa is now being cast as one of the bad left.

PRESIDENTRAFAELCORREA: [translated] With all due respect, knowing the North American media, I would be more worried if they spoke well of me.

REPORTER: Today, the Argentinian president, with concern about US trade policy, seemed in no hurry to embrace his American counterpart.

NÉSTOR KIRCHNER: [translated] Bush told me the best way to revitalize the economy is war and that the United States has grown stronger with war. Those were his exact words.

NARRATOR: This summer, take an incredible look at an extraordinary movement.

PRESIDENTLUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA: [translated] For the first time, the poor are treated like human beings.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] And perhaps this is one of the things that keeps us going — the optimism, faith and hope, and the concrete evidence that we can change the course of history. It’s possible, Oliver.

NARRATOR: South of the Border.

OLIVERSTONE: I’m just curious. How many sets of shoes do you have?

PRESIDENTCRISTINAKIRCHNER: [translated] They always ask questions like this to women. I don’t get it. They never ask a man how many pairs of shoes he has.

AMYGOODMAN: And that was the trailer for Oliver Stone’s South of the Border. It’s being released this week in New York. South of the Border — the leftist transformation in the region might be ignored or misrepresented as nothing but anti-Americanism in the mainstream media, but the film seeks to tell a different story — released in Latin America earlier this month, opening here in the United States this week.

Award-winning director Oliver Stone joins us here in New York. And we’re joined by the acclaimed writer and activist Tariq Ali. He co-wrote the screenplay for South of Border with Mark Weisbrot.

We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Oliver Stone, welcome for the first time to Democracy Now!

OLIVERSTONE: Thank you, Amy.

AMYGOODMAN: It’s good to have you here. Talk about why you chose to make this film.

OLIVERSTONE: It chose me. I do feature films most of the time, but I do — I’ve done six documentaries and work — this is my fourth one. And it gets right to the point. You know, with a film, you take a year. It’s a lot of money. It’s a lot of actors, costumes, scripts. This is a much simpler way of going about it, and it keeps you humble. It keeps you in the field.

I’ve been going down to South America off and on for twenty years. I did Salvador

there in 1985 with — about the Central America situation. I was shocked, what I saw. I just — I had been back from Vietnam for about fifteen years at that point, and I saw all these American soldiers down in Honduras, you know, fighting against the Nicaraguan government. I saw them in Salvador, and I saw them in — a form of them —- in Costa Rica. I was shocked. And from that thing, I went back and saw Chiapas. I saw Commander Marcos. I rode with him a bit in the jungle. And then I went down there to Cuba. I had problems with Cuba, because my films were censored here. They were not shown. One of them was not shown; Comandante was taken off the air. It was shown in Europe. And then, so, Chávez -—

AMYGOODMAN: Where wasn’t it shown?

OLIVERSTONE: It was not shown on HBO. It was pulled from HBO. It was promoed, and then it was taken off the air two weeks before.

AMYGOODMAN: Why?

OLIVERSTONE: Because that was after 9 — it was after that sort of that mindset of post-9/11, you know? There was a lot of hysteria in the air, and Castro had just arrested hijackers. They’d been in confrontation with Bush. So HBO kindly told me, you know, "We’d like you to complete the film and go back and ask him some other questions." I said, "No, this is my film. This is the way it’s finished. I’ll go back, and I’ll do another film called Looking for Fidel," which we ended up doing. So I asked him a lot of hard questions on Looking for Fidel, which was aired. But they never aired the — it’s a heartbreaking story for me, personally, as a filmmaker, because I really put a lot of effort into it. It’s a ninety-minute film. It’s played all over the world, except here.

So, Chávez was sort of a natural, because he was such a demonized, polarizing figure. But when I met him, he was not at all what I thought, you know, what we made him out to be. So I went on from talking to Hugo. He suggested, you know, "Go talk to other people in the region. You know, don’t believe me necessarily." So we went around, and we talked to seven other — eight other presidents — or seven other presidents in six countries. And we got this amazing unity in referendum saying, like, hey, these guys are changing the way Latin America is, and we don’t know this story in America, when you think about it, except Peru and Mexico — well, Peru and Colombia really are the two American allies in the region. So what struck me as a news, as something that’s historic, is that I’ve never seen these countries in South America, in a sense, unified by an idea of reform at the same time, because in the past, when Chile or Argentina or Brazil happened, we picked off the reformers one at a time, because they only happened — they didn’t happen in a unity. And this is the first time I’ve seen that since — what, since Bolívar, maybe. We haven’t — you know, going back to 1820s.

JUANGONZALEZ: Well, what struck me also was, I think, the way you were able not only to present their viewpoints, in terms of how they saw the changes in Latin America, but also humanizing them, because for an American audience, the image of Hugo Chávez, of this firebrand, and then you have him on a bicycle in his — riding around in the yard of his former home, breaking the bicycle. And then —-

OLIVERSTONE: Yeah.

JUANGONZALEZ: I thought the most comic line in the whole film was when, after breaking the bicycle, he says, in Spanish, "Whose bicycle is this? I guess I’m going to have to pay for it."

OLIVERSTONE: He’s not rich. His father is not rich, and he was also a military man. And he comes from a poor family. And he is what he is. He works for the people. I’ve never seen a man work so hard. I mean, he really cares. So do all of them, by the way. Every single one of them I met was elected duly, democratically, which Americans don’t know. And they serve the people, unlike a lot of the oligarchs and dictators who ruled prior and we supported. But we’re against these people. That’s what amazes me. Why is our -— what is it about America that makes — needs enemies and makes enemies out of these people who are reformers in their country? Whether it’s Allende or the people in Argentina or Brazil, or Torrijos in Panama, or — the list is long. You know, why? Nicaragua.

JUANGONZALEZ: You also center in on the IMF and the role of the IMF, which, again, most Americans know little about the operations of the IMF around the world. Yet, in most other countries in the world, the IMF is well known.

OLIVERSTONE: Mark Weisbrot is with the Center of Economic Policy and Research, and he’s a co-founder of that, and he brought that element into this. It’s very important. And obviously Americans don’t care about economics as much; it’s hard to follow. But Mark points out that in the 1990s, there was about $20 billion in loans from the IMF to Latin America. Now there’s about a billion, which is interesting. They got rid of it, as Kirchner, Néstor Kirchner of Argentina, is a real hero here. He did technically default on the IMF, but then he paid them off. And he defaulted on the corporate bonds, which was a big scandal, but yet Argentine economy, which was predicted to be a disaster, improved radically. So did Chávez’s economy for six years. I think the gross national product went 90 percent up, up 90 percent. Poverty was cut in half. So all these changes in all these countries have been positive since the IMF is out. They don’t want our money. They don’t want the loans. It’s important.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to go right now to a clip of Hugo Chávez talking about oil.

OLIGARCHYMEMBER: We have a government that lies. They’re all a bunch of liars.

OLIVERSTONE: They control the Venezuelan media and used it to foment opposition. They also mobilized support within the military and received help from the United States and Spain.

GEN. CAMACHOKAIRUZ: [translated] I think the most reasonable thing for the President and his cabinet to do is resign voluntarily or disappear from the country.

OLIVERSTONE: A businessman, Pedro Carmona, was chosen to be the new president. He supposedly flew to Madrid to be measured for a presidential sash.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The coup against Chávez had one motive: oil. Bush made a plan: first, Chávez, oil; second, Saddam, Iraq. The reason behind the coup in Venezuela and the invasion of Iraq is the same: oil.

AMYGOODMAN: That was Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez. Oliver Stone, talk about how the US media portrays Chávez.

OLIVERSTONE: Well, all you have to do is go to YouTube, and you’ll see. I mean, we put in the movie, it’s hysterical and outrageous. And by the way, mainstream — Washington Post, New York Times — it’s awful. I mean, it’s almost as if the New York Times guy — Simon Romero is his name — he sits there for years, and he’s a sniper. He doesn’t say one positive thing. It’s like every week or two he has to file his story, make it negative. It seems like that’s a directive. And he goes out — I mean, you read this stuff. All of it — and he never goes to the other side. He never gets the other side of the story. And he gets very complex little incidents, and he builds it up into this madhouse. It seems like it’s Chile again, like Allende. It’s like the economy is crashing. And the contrary is true. I mean, it’s a very rich country. It’s a regional power. It’s got, apparently, $500 billion — 5,000 billion barrels of oil in reserve. It’s a major player for the rest of our time on earth, as long as we go with oil. You know, they’re not going to go away. So, Brazil and Venezuela.

And that raises a whole interesting thing about what recently happened in Iran, you know, when Lula from Brazil went over there with Turkey, Erdogan. That was a very interesting moment for me and for Tariq, because I grew up in the '50s, so did he, and we remember the neutral bloc, remember the — remember Nehru and Nasser and Sukarno and fellow in Cambodia.

TARIQALI: Sihanouk

OLIVERSTONE: Sihanouk. I mean, there was a bloc of people who used to say, "Hey, this is what we want. This is not what the United States wants." And they were a mediator, a third rail between the Soviets and us. That's gone in the world, and people don’t seem to realize it who are growing up. So when Lula did that, I couldn’t believe the outrage by people like Tom Friedman attacking him. And it was disgusting, I thought, really disgusting, because he never presented the point of view of Brazil and Turkey, which are major countries, huge powers, regional powers.

JUANGONZALEZ: And the New York Times, of course, before that trip, was blasting the possibility of Lula being able to negotiate any kind of arrangement and basically saying he was naive, he was out of his league. And Tariq, your response? The impact of that deal that was brokered by Turkey and —-

TARIQALI: Look, I mean, everyone was surprised in the West, that how dare these countries have the nerve to go over our heads and negotiate an independent deal with Iran. But this is what the world once used to be like. No one accepted US hegemony unquestioningly, as many of the Security Council members do. The other point is that Brazil was very courageous to do this, Lula particularly, because Brazil has been trying to get a Security -— permanent Security Council seat for a long time, and they’ve now jeopardized that process. They will never be allowed it. So they did it for good principled reasons, showing the world Iran is prepared to do a deal; it’s you who don’t want to do it, because you’re permanently under pressure from Israel.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to go to break and then come back. Our guests are Tariq Ali — he co-wrote South of the Border — Oliver Stone is the Oscar award-winning director and screenwriter. His latest film is South of the Border, and he also has Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps coming out. That’s Wall Street 2. Stay with us.

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AMYGOODMAN: We are talking to Oliver Stone, who has done this new film that’s coming out this week in the United States called South of the Border. Tariq Ali co-wrote South of the Border. And we want to turn to the Brazilian president, Lula da Silva, talking about Brazil.

PRESIDENTLUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA: [translated] I learned as a trade unionist that one only respects someone who respects themselves. I personally have no interest in fighting with the United States. The only thing I want is to be treated as equals. When I met with the head of the IMF and paid off the debt in full, he did not want me to pay the debt. He said, "Don’t worry about the money. We can roll it over. Keep the money." We paid off the IMF. We paid off the Paris Club. We do not owe anything to anybody. And now we have $260 billion surplus. I am truly optimistic.

AMYGOODMAN: That was Lula da Silva, the Brazilian president. Oliver Stone uses the clips to talk to us. Now we’re going to say that right on the air, what you’re saying about Lula da Silva, about Chávez, and now they’re covered and how they’re censored in various ways.

OLIVERSTONE: You go.

TARIQALI: Well —-

AMYGOODMAN: Tariq Ali?

TARIQALI: Why? Why does this happen? That’s the question we have to ask. Why are these people so hated by the mainstream media in the United States? And the answer is simple: that they present an alternative. What they’re doing is using their wealth, especially the oil wealth of Venezuela, to bail out the poor. Here, it’s the rich who are bailed out by taxpayers’ money. In South America, it’s the poor who are bailed out by the wealth, which they regard as owned commonly by the people.

And they were the first countries to attack neoliberal economics, which collapsed in Wall Street in 2008. The whole Wall Street system collapsed. These guys had been doing it for ten, fifteen years previously. So none of them were surprised by the Wall Street crash, because of what they’d been doing. So we should look at them as pioneers. Hey guys, you were the ones who taught us that this could happen in Argentina, in Venezuela, and later Brazil, Ecuador.

JUANGONZALEZ: And Oliver Stone, we’re going to play a clip, when you were interviewing Néstor Kirchner. And you see him as a real hero in this, even within the pantheon of these leaders, because he actually stood up directly to George Bush at a summit, an important summit a few years back in Argentina, over this issue of neoliberalism.

OLIVERSTONE: Yeah, not only him, but he’s also now the president of UNASUR, which is the union of these countries. This is a new deal. And it’s not just him, but he led -— he was the first one to say no to the Western neoliberal economics. And he actually was — they were predicting disaster. There had been like four or five Argentine presidents right before him, one after another. And he lasted. And he brought the country out of this horrifying cycle, and it prospered enormously, up until recently, with the — the world recession has put some of these countries, no question.

JUANGONZALEZ: But let’s take a look at that clip of Kirchner.

OLIVERSTONE: Were there any eye-to-eye moments with President Bush that day, that night?

NÉSTOR KIRCHNER: [translated] I say it’s not necessary to kneel before power. Nor do you need to be rude to say the things you have to say to those who oppose our actions. We had a discussion in Monterey. I said that a solution to the problems right now, I told Bush, is a Marshall Plan. And he got angry. He said the Marshall Plan is a crazy idea of the Democrats. He said the best way to revitalize the economy is war and that the United States has grown stronger with war.

OLIVERSTONE: War. He said that?

NÉSTOR KIRCHNER: [translated] He said that. Those were his exact words.

OLIVERSTONE: Was he suggesting that South America go to war?

NÉSTOR KIRCHNER: [translated] Well, he was talking about the United States. The Democrats had been wrong. All of the economic growth of the United States has been encouraged by the various wars. He said it very clearly. President Bush is — well, he’s only got six days left, right?

OLIVERSTONE: Yes.

NÉSTOR KIRCHNER: [translated] Thank God.

JUANGONZALEZ: That was former President Kirchner. And these comments of President Bush that he says about the United States growing strong through war, I don’t think that’s ever been reported anywhere.

OLIVERSTONE: Well, it goes to the heart of the issue. And, you know, we know it, but we sound jaded when we say it. But why do we all — why does America go to war? I went to Vietnam. We went — right after that, we didn’t — I made three movies about it. And then we went back to Panama. We invaded Panama, Grenada, then we went into Iraq twice and now Afghanistan. I don’t get it. And there has to be a reason for all this corporate march to war. Why do — and the press supports it. And we saw it in Iraq most vividly. It was very depressing to be a Vietnam veteran at that time. And now we’re seeing it again with Iran and with Afghanistan, the support of this war. I don’t — there’s no sense to it, because we don’t resemble the Afghani or the Vietnam average person. Our soldiers have to go. If they’re going to go there, they’ve got to stay. That’s all there is to it. They’ve got to become citizens of Afghanistan. That’s the only way they’re ever going to make it. They’re not. There’s no way we’re going to say, and they know it. And as long as they know we’re leaving, I don’t see any victory, any exit, any exit strategy at all.

AMYGOODMAN: Let’s go, since you talked about your time in Vietnam, to one of your most well-known films, a clip of Platoon.

SGT. BARNES: What about the [bleep] rice and the weapons? Who are they for? A VC? That [bleep] knows what I’m saying. He understands. Don’t you, pop?

ACE: Goddamn right, he does.

SGT. BARNES: [inaudible]

JUNIOR: He’s lying through his teeth! Come on!

TONY: Waste the [bleep], then see who talks.

SGT. BARNES: VC! Where’s VC?

LERNER: He doesn’t know anything.

VIETNAMESEVILLAGEWOMAN: [speaking Vietnamese]

LERNER: He swears he doesn’t know anything. He hates the NVA, but they come when they want, and they just take the place over.

SGT. BARNES: What’s the [bleep] saying?

LERNER: I don’t know. She’s going on about why are we killing the pigs, their farmers. They’ve got to make a living. All that kind of [bleep].

SGT. BARNES: Jeez!

SOLDIER: Shut up!

SGT. BARNES: [shoots village woman] You tell him he starts talking, or I’m going to waste more of them. Tell him, Lerner!

LERNER: [speaking Vietnamese]

VIETNAMESEVILLAGEMAN: [speaking Vietnamese]

ACE: Sir, let us in on this, alright?

AMYGOODMAN: A scene from Platoon.

OLIVERSTONE: Yeah.

AMYGOODMAN: Oliver Stone.

OLIVERSTONE: I don’t get it. I think — I mean, we trashed Vietnam, I mean, completely. We didn’t even recognize it for so many years after the war. We did the same thing to Iraq. I wouldn’t want to live in Iraq. I mean, they call it democracy? That’s not democracy. It’s the same thing over and over. Why? Why does — I see all the — I don’t watch TV as much as a lot of people, but what I see is people all get on the air, they talk about our discretionary spending, they talk about the Tea Party people, they talk about education, cutting this, this — I don’t get it. Why, if the majority of our discretionary spending is Pentagon — it’s like a trillion dollars, with a shadow budget in there, a trillion dollars a year, that’s most of the discretionary spending in this country — why is it going to war? If we’re in such bad shape, why are we not taking care of ourselves? Why is Obama embracing this?

And why is Clinton down in Latin America, when I’m there, trying to separate these countries? And we’re still doing the same thing. We’re trying to divide one country from the other. She goes to Bolivia — she goes to Ecuador. She goes to Argentina. She tries to separate them. She’s trying to pull Brazil away from Venezuela. It doesn’t work. They’re together in this. This is the first time — I repeat, Amy — the first time in our lifetime that I’ve seen these so many countries in Latin America together, with the exception of Peru and Colombia.

AMYGOODMAN: And we’re going to talk about Colombia in a minute, but Juan?

JUANGONZALEZ: Well, on this issue of war and, of course, the statement that President Bush made, which to me was startling, is, in essence, when our government goes to war, not only does it spend huge amounts of money that it turns over to the contractors who assist the war, but also technological development always increases sharply, sponsored by the government. And then, after the war, these same companies then use the new technological development to open up new arenas of business. So, in that sense, I think Bush was talking about how war —-

TARIQALI: Well, no, that — he was very honest. The thing is that Bush used to spell it out straight, which is why people didn’t like him that much, because he just said it. I mean, often what he said was true from his point of view, and from the point of view of the corporations. He didn’t wear a mask. He didn’t use emollient words, which is what happens now.

But the other thing I was thinking, as we were just seeing that clip from Platoon, is, why isn’t there a movie like that about Iraq now? I mean, quite a lot of the movies we are seeing, the Iraqis don’t appear. And yet, we know what has been done to Iraq: a million have died. A million Iraqis have died since the occupation. But we don’t really get a glimpse of them. So the enemy is dehumanized, or that they’re all Muslims and so it doesn’t matter if we kill them — after all, they did 9/11. And all this rubbish that goes on endlessly to misinform the public, that’s what we’re seeing.

AMYGOODMAN: Before you leave, Oliver Stone, I wanted to ask you about the sequel you’ve made to your hit Wall Street. It’s called Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps. This is a famous clip from the original Wall Street, featuring Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko.

GORDONGEKKO: Point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms — greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge — has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed — you mark my words — will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you very much.

AMYGOODMAN: So, is Gordon Gekko making another appearance?

OLIVERSTONE: The film is, you know, a visit to another planet. It’s twenty-three years later, that Wall Street has become worse. We know that. I mean, millions of dollars have become billions of dollars. The currency is now completely inflated. And the values are the same. The bank — but the big difference is the banks are doing it now. I mean, it’s not the hedge funds, it’s the banks. And they overloaded, and we all overloaded, but the banks led the charge, and the government allowed it to happen. But we know the story. I don’t want to go there.

The movie is a movie, and it’s fun, and it’s got five people in it who are — it’s a triangle, essentially, between Gordon and his daughter, Carey Mulligan, and her fiancé, Shia LaBeouf. And Josh Brolin and Frank Langella play mentors to Shia LaBeouf. It’s a fun movie, but, you know — and in that transaction, you come to this — for me, what’s the essential question: what is your life about? Is it going to be about money, or is it going to be about love? Is it going to be about family values and things that matter, human values, or is it about money?

It’s like South America. It’s the same thing. And the Wall Street guys, I mean, the big guys, you know, they’re part of the IMF, International Monetary Fund. They’re part of the whole deal, which is, make loans to people, get them on the hook, get them into — they’re drug addicts — keep them to be drug addicts, keep people stupid, and make money. Nothing has changed since my father’s day, and he started in 1930s.

AMYGOODMAN: And what did he do?

OLIVERSTONE: He was a broker.

AMYGOODMAN: So, Wall Street, you thought, was a warning to people.

OLIVERSTONE: Yeah, yeah.

AMYGOODMAN: And yet you attracted people to Wall Street.

OLIVERSTONE: It was a melodrama about financial movies, which had not been made in this country. As he said, why don’t they make a movie about Iraq? They were not making any movies about financial situation. Now they have it wall to wall on TV. I’m glad, but it’s not really dealing with the fundamental issues. It’s about the surface: who’s making money, who isn’t, right? Who’s a big star, who isn’t? All these CEOs make the magazine covers. I think that’s pretty vile, considering that in the old days, when I grew up, if you had a lot of money, like John Rockefeller, you kind of like hid. You know, you always tried to do — tried to stay low-key. But now it’s gotten insane. There’s a scene in the movie with a thousand billionaires are listed. A thousand billionaires — can you imagine that? You grew up when, what, there were four or five billionaires in the world. It’s unfortunate.

But it ties into the whole thing. It’s organic. Latin America comes from Wall Street, too. Wall Street, you know, you could say — I’m sure Tariq could make a better argument — runs the world. Wall Street, the pharmaceutical lobbies, the oil lobbies, they run our government. We should consider, in the wake of this spill, perhaps doing something about nationalizing our own government and trying to get the profits back to the people, because Latin America has shown us that they care about the people more than the profits. And they’ve done well with the people. We haven’t.

JUANGONZALEZ: And through all of these films now that you’ve made over decades, the overriding message that ties them together in terms of what your artistic vision is?

OLIVERSTONE: Well, I believe in — movies have to be fun. You’ve got to go and have a — you know, if you can take the JFK story and make it exciting, I mean, that may be not — that’s good. I mean, it makes people interested. A new generation looks at it. Wall Street's the same thing. It makes them interested in what's going on in the world. That’s all I can do. Documentaries is another form of filmmaking.

AMYGOODMAN: The five million-dollar question on JFK today, your thoughts on his assassination?

OLIVERSTONE: Listen, I think JFK is a much-maligned president, but I think he really changed in 1963. I stick to the — and, by the way, James Douglas has a new book. McGeorge Bundy came out recently. Gordon Goldstein, I believe is the name, wrote a wonderful book about Bundy. He said I was all wrong. Kennedy wanted to pull out. He confirms what McNamara said. In '63, Kennedy wanted out of Vietnam. He wanted to make a deal with Cuba, with Castro. And he wanted — he certainly — the most important thing was he had a détente going with Khrushchev. All these things ended when he was shot. And Johnson, whatever they say, went the other way completely, 180 degrees.

AMYGOODMAN: And who you think killed him?

OLIVERSTONE: The motive is in that answer.

AMYGOODMAN: Well, I want to thank you very much for being with us, Oliver Stone. Tariq, you're going to stay with us. Tariq Ali —-

AMYGOODMAN: Thank you so much, and good luck with South of the Border.

OLIVERSTONE: Thank you.

AMYGOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, the War and Peace Report. We’ll be back in a minute.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: We’re staying with Tariq Ali. He’s a well-known writer and activist, co-wrote South of the Border, Oliver Stone’s film that’s opening this week. And we want to stay on this film. We want to go to Ecuador, to Oliver Stone speaking with Ecuador’s president Rafael Correa.

OLIVERSTONE: Where are you with the United States?

PRESIDENTRAFAELCORREA: [translated] We love the United States very much. I lived there. I studied there. We love the people of the United States very much. But obviously, the US foreign policy is questionable. That’s why when they want to pressure us to maintain their military base in our country, a foreign base that they don’t pay anything for, either, and they accuse us of being extremists because we don’t want the base -— if there’s no problem having foreign military bases in a country, we set a very specific condition: we would keep the North American base in Manta, provided they let us put a military base in Miami. If there’s no problem with foreign bases, then we should be able to have one over there.

AMYGOODMAN: That’s the Ecuadoran president Rafael Correa. Tariq Ali?

TARIQALI: Well, I mean, you know, what can one say? He says, "When the American media attacks me, I know I’m doing right." And that is a view which large numbers of South American leaders have now. The fact that they are traduced, denounced in the mainstream media in this country doesn’t bother them so much. You know, Hugo Chávez says if the New York Times started supporting me, I would be very surprised. So, outside the United States, and probably for large numbers of people inside it, as well, the media is now a central pillar of the needs of the state and the government and what it does. I mean, that whole thing during the Cold War, when diversity and diverse voices were allowed on the networks and in the press, that’s gone now. They’re very blatant about it. And no one takes it too seriously. I mean, it’s irritating, and sometimes it’s slanderous, but it’s not a surprise.

JUANGONZALEZ: Well, Tariq, I’d like to ask you, because you were there when a lot of these interviews were conducted with these various presidents. And obviously, while they’re all united around a new independent role, they have considerable differences among themselves, in terms of what are the proper approaches or strategies on a variety of issues, certainly between Lula and Hugo Chávez or the Kirchners. Could you talk about that some?

TARIQALI: Well, I think you’re absolutely right, Juan. I mean, Lula’s economic policies are very different from those of Chávez and Morales. He decided soon after he came to power that he couldn’t basically dismantle the neoliberal system. It was too much, and he thought it was safer to go that way. So, essentially what they did was a few cosmetic things, not unimportant, by giving subsidies to the poor, which is important, but they didn’t touch the system. And I think that has been a problem for some of his supporters. However, in terms of foreign policy, Lula made a big break. He said Brazil will no longer be used to demobilize countries like Venezuela or Bolivia. We will not participate in destabilizing them, in demobilizing those people. And he told that very clearly to the United States. Don’t even try and do it. I don’t necessarily agree with everything that these people do, but it’s their right to do it. And that, for South America, marks a big leap forward.

AMYGOODMAN: Talk about what happened in Colombia, the election.

TARIQALI: Well, I mean, Colombia, it’s just now beyond a joke, really. It was bound to happen. Uribe couldn’t stand again, for constitutional reasons, and he’s put in his minister. The guy largely responsible for the repression, the guy largely responsible for supervising some of the death squads, the guy totally in the pocket of the US embassy, is now president of Colombia. Colombia is the big US base in South America now. Peru, to a lesser extent. Colombia is the big base. This is where money is being poured in. This is where US military bases are being built. And Correa recently, the president of Ecuador, made it very clear. He said to the Colombians, if your troops ever come into our country again, like you did once before, for whatever the reason, we are going to fight back, so don’t do it. And this is from Correa, who is regarded by the State Department here as the more reasonable of the Bolivarian leaders. He is warning the Colombians about this. So Hillary Clinton’s trip to try and divide them from each other really backfired. It’s not going to work, because South America has changed.

AMYGOODMAN: The new foreign — the new president of Colombia will be the former defense minister, Juan Manuel Santos.

TARIQALI: Yeah.

JUANGONZALEZ: And, of course, in the film, you deal with all of the new presidents, but then you go back to Raúl Castro of Cuba and one of the, I think, first interviews that Americans have seen of Raúl Castro after he replaced Fidel as the president of Cuba. Let’s go to that clip.

PRESIDENT RAÚL CASTRO: [translated] The Cubans are the heirs of the liberators of the Americas, starting with Bolívar, Sucre, Toussaint L’ouverture, the Haitian, the first and only successful revolution led by slaves in the history of the world. We are the heirs of some of the more recent battles of other companions who have fallen, like Che Guevara. Now some are young, like President Correa and President Chávez. But each one is learning their own identity and finding their own identity within the continent.

AMYGOODMAN: That was Raúl Castro. And by the way, Tariq Ali has written the book Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope, about Evo Morales, Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez. So what do you think of Raúl Castro and where Fidel Castro fits into this picture?

TARIQALI: Well, Fidel was, you know, I mean, an iconic leader, still is. And even people in South America who hate him know that he is one of those figures produced in South American history once or twice maybe in a hundred years. So that will never go.

The interesting thing now is what will happen in Cuba. And this is literally a million-dollar question. Which way are they going to go? The US has certainly not made any conciliatory moves, though there were a lot of hopes that Obama would do it. But as in every other thing, the continuities between Obama and the Bush administration are more striking than any breach. So, the Cubans could go the Chinese route, keeping the party in power, opening up the economy. It’s very difficult to find out, penetrate what is being discussed at the upper levels.

However, what is not difficult to see is that the Cuban social services — their medicine, their education — is now helping the whole of South America, Amy. It’s quite — you know, this is what is very noticeable, that you have Cuban doctors now in most South American countries, helping the poor, setting up clinics, and often going to, you know, parts of Africa, as well, and doing the same thing, and training people. And the Cuban medical university has got people from all over, including hundreds and hundreds of Venezuelan kids from poor families. I remember when I was in Havana, and they took me to the school. And there were some Afro-American kids from the United States learning to be medical students. And I said, "How do you guys find it here?" And they said, "We’ve never known anything like this before. We would never be able to get this education in our own country." And the government here was aware of it, because Colin Powell exempted these students from the boycott. So they know that what the United States can’t do, this tiny little island is doing.

So there are lots of good things to be understood and learned about Cuba, which, I mean, I’ve always said that the Cubans and the Venezuelans could learn a lot from each other. The Venezuelans could learn on how to produce a social infrastructure that serves the people, and the Cubans could learn that having critical voices in a country is not always harmful. It keeps you on your toes, and it makes you more alert.

JUANGONZALEZ: Let’s go to a clip from Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo from the film.

PRESIDENTFERNANDOLUGO: [translated] It hasn’t been easy to create change in this country. Here, there’s a group which has historically been privileged in the government with the country’s resources. We want to be consistent with the theory of liberation theology. If there are going to be the privileged, then it has to be those who in the past have been forgotten: the indigenous, the landless, the uneducated, the sick. Those are the ones who need to be the first priority. We are committed to honesty, transparency, and to give back dignity to our institutions, and with much more social justice.

AMYGOODMAN: The Paraguayan president Lugo. The significance of this priest-turned-president?

TARIQALI: Well, the significance is that Paraguay is a country which has essentially been a one-party state for so long that people forgot when it was anything else. And the stranglehold of this party and the country’s rich prevented anything from coming up. And then you have this priest, you know, a bishop who sort of was later discarded his bishop’s frocks, leading the people, fighting for the poor, and actually winning an election.

And I think one reason that happened is because of the changes taking place elsewhere in South America. I remember I was giving a talk in Porto Alegre at one of the World Social Forums, and sitting in the sixth row somewhere was this priest from Paraguay, which was Lugo. And later on, he told a friend of mine, "Oh, I know him. I heard him speak at Porto Alegre." So, the mixture that was South America helped propel him to power. And people felt confident. They think, if they can do it in other parts of South America, why can’t we? So he was an incredibly popular figure. And as I must say, the scale of his victory stunned us, because we thought they might rig the elections or do something. But the mood was so overwhelming and the number of poor who turned up to vote was so huge that they couldn’t do it. So it goes to show that the collective spirit of South America, which we haven’t seen for a very long time, which the Cubans in the '60s and ’70s were hoping for, you know, OLAS and this and that, is now coming to fruition. For how long, we don't know. But 'til now, the US hasn't been able to turn that tide back. And with allies like Colombia, it is very unlikely that they will. And had they not rigged the elections in Mexico, we would have had a different president there, too.

AMYGOODMAN: Before you leave us, Tariq, we wanted to go to another continent. We wanted to talk about Afghanistan and Pakistan. You are from Pakistan.

TARIQALI: Mm-hmm.

AMYGOODMAN: Your latest book is on Pakistan — you’ve written many — the book called The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power. What do you think of Obama’s war now in Afghanistan and what’s happening in Pakistan?

TARIQALI: Look, if you look at Obama, that on all the other foreign policy shows he basically continued with Bush’s policies. Let’s be blunt about this. In Afghanistan, he went beyond Bush. He escalated the war. He went along with this policy of the surge. And he ordered more drone attacks on civilians in Pakistan in his one year in office than Bush had done during his last term. So, for the people of that region, Obama’s presidency has been a total disaster. And it’s not working. If you read the reports coming out of Afghanistan, they’re losing more people. There are more casualties. More Afghan civilians are being killed. They have a puppet leader, Karzai, who’s developing his own sort of dynamic, because he’s grown very wealthy through corruption and thinks that he has genuine support. Puppets sometimes have these illusions. And he can’t be got rid of, because they’ve got no one to replace him. So they are really stuck in Afghanistan. And if — and they’re deficient, as we know, within the US military-political establishment on this war. And the ones who are saying that this is an unwinnable war are absolutely right. It’s a stalemated war. They can’t win it unless they destroy half the population of the country.

JUANGONZALEZ: And the impact on Pakistan of the continued drone attacks and the continued secret war going on in Pakistan?

TARIQALI: Well, this is it. They’ve been — the drones have been killing civilians. I mean, I point out that the day that the tragedy happened in Tehran and that young woman Nehda was killed — accidentally, it so happens, but she was killed, which was terrible and a tragedy — we had a moist-eyed president in the White House talking to the media on what a terrible tragedy that was, and the same day, a drone attack in Pakistan killed fifteen innocents, mainly women and children, who didn’t even make it onto the news bulletins. So that is what people see. And then, why are they surprised that people are so hostile to the United States in that part of the world?

AMYGOODMAN: We’ll have to leave it there, Tariq Ali, British Pakistani political commentator, historian, activist, filmmaker. He co-wrote the screenplay South of the Border. His latest book, The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power.

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Mon, 21 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0400Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on How to Tackle Climate Change: "We Must Go from Capitalism to Socialism"http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/21/venezuelan_president_hugo_chavez_on_how
tag:democracynow.org,2009-12-21:en/story/aa3396 AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now! , democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report . I&#8217;m Amy Goodman. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez spared no criticism of the climate conference in Copenhagen. At a joint news conference he held with the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, on Friday afternoon—this was before President Obama announced the accord—Chávez called the proceedings undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. He described President Obama as having won the &quot;Nobel War Prize&quot; and said the world still smelled of sulfur, referring to his comments about President Bush at the United Nations last year.
Well, shortly after the news conference, I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes.
AMY GOODMAN : You sell more oil to the United States than any country but Canada. Your economy depends on oil, yet you are here at a climate change summit. What&#8217;s your proposal?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The problem is not the oil, but what they do with the oil. The United States is the biggest spender of oil and of all the planet resources. Oil is a very valuable resource for life—electric heaters. We must have to transition ourselves to a post-oil era. And that&#8217;s what we must discuss: searching and developing new sources of energy. And that requires scientific research. That requires investment. And the developed countries must be the ones to assume this responsibility first.
AMY GOODMAN : What level of emissions are you willing to support reductions of emissions?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That&#8217;s the real solution.
AMY GOODMAN : How do you throw away capitalism?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That&#8217;s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.
AMY GOODMAN : President Obama—what is your reaction to his speech today?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] Obama is a big frustration. In my opinion, Obama can become one of the biggest frustrations in the history for many people, not for me, but for the people of the United States that voted for him and saw him as a symbol of hope for change. But he has given continually to the most aggressive Bush policies, the imperialist policies.
AMY GOODMAN : What example of that?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The war. I told Obama, when he took the initiative to come visit us in the Summit of the Americas—we talked for a few minutes. I told him, &quot;Obama, let&#8217;s work for peace in Colombia. That&#8217;s what I am proposing. Let&#8217;s get a team together to analyze the problem.&quot; But absolutely nothing. He is now installing seven military bases in Colombia. That&#8217;s just one example.
And in Iraq and Afghanistan, policies of war. Guantánamo, it is a great frustration. And I feel sorry, not for me. You are from the United States. I feel sorry for you, because you deserve a government that takes care of the problems of the people of the United States and stops thinking about dominating the rest of the world and just governs over the United States, eradicates the problems of the United States, the poverty, the inequality, which gets bigger every day, the unemployment, families on the street, homeless, without Social Security, diseases. I wish for you to get a government that truly takes care of you first and then works towards peace for the rest of the world.
AMY GOODMAN : The U.S. government calls you a dictator. What is your response?
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I&#8217;m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, &quot;They are going to bite us.&quot; And Quixote wisely answers, &quot;Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping.&quot; I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, speaking to us in Copenhagen on Friday. AMYGOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez spared no criticism of the climate conference in Copenhagen. At a joint news conference he held with the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, on Friday afternoon—this was before President Obama announced the accord—Chávez called the proceedings undemocratic and accused world leaders of only seeking a face-saving agreement. He described President Obama as having won the "Nobel War Prize" and said the world still smelled of sulfur, referring to his comments about President Bush at the United Nations last year.

Well, shortly after the news conference, I caught up with President Chávez for a few minutes.

AMYGOODMAN: You sell more oil to the United States than any country but Canada. Your economy depends on oil, yet you are here at a climate change summit. What’s your proposal?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The problem is not the oil, but what they do with the oil. The United States is the biggest spender of oil and of all the planet resources. Oil is a very valuable resource for life—electric heaters. We must have to transition ourselves to a post-oil era. And that’s what we must discuss: searching and developing new sources of energy. And that requires scientific research. That requires investment. And the developed countries must be the ones to assume this responsibility first.

AMYGOODMAN: What level of emissions are you willing to support reductions of emissions?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] One hundred percent. One hundred percent. We must reduce the emissions 100 percent. In Venezuela, the emissions are currently insignificant compared to the emissions of the developed countries. We are in agreement. We must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However, that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model: We must go from capitalism to socialism. That’s the real solution.

AMYGOODMAN: How do you throw away capitalism?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The way they did it in Cuba. That’s the way. The same way we are doing in Venezuela: giving the power to the people and taking it away from the economic elites. You can only do that through a revolution.

AMYGOODMAN: President Obama—what is your reaction to his speech today?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] Obama is a big frustration. In my opinion, Obama can become one of the biggest frustrations in the history for many people, not for me, but for the people of the United States that voted for him and saw him as a symbol of hope for change. But he has given continually to the most aggressive Bush policies, the imperialist policies.

AMYGOODMAN: What example of that?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] The war. I told Obama, when he took the initiative to come visit us in the Summit of the Americas—we talked for a few minutes. I told him, "Obama, let’s work for peace in Colombia. That’s what I am proposing. Let’s get a team together to analyze the problem." But absolutely nothing. He is now installing seven military bases in Colombia. That’s just one example.

And in Iraq and Afghanistan, policies of war. Guantánamo, it is a great frustration. And I feel sorry, not for me. You are from the United States. I feel sorry for you, because you deserve a government that takes care of the problems of the people of the United States and stops thinking about dominating the rest of the world and just governs over the United States, eradicates the problems of the United States, the poverty, the inequality, which gets bigger every day, the unemployment, families on the street, homeless, without Social Security, diseases. I wish for you to get a government that truly takes care of you first and then works towards peace for the rest of the world.

AMYGOODMAN: The U.S. government calls you a dictator. What is your response?

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] I laugh. I laugh. It is the empire calling me a dictator. I’m happy. And I remember Don Quixote, Quixote who was with Sancho, you know, and the dogs start to bark, and Sancho says, "They are going to bite us." And Quixote wisely answers, "Take it easy, Sancho, because if the dogs are barking, it is because we are galloping." I will be very sad and worried if the imperialist government was calling me a great democratic man. No, it is them, the empire, who attack those who are truly contributing to the real democracy.

AMYGOODMAN: Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, speaking to us in Copenhagen on Friday.

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Mon, 21 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0500A Debate on Hugo Chavez and Venezuela's Failed Constitutional Referendumhttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/12/17/a_debate_on_hugo_chavez_and
tag:democracynow.org,2007-12-17:en/story/f5a6fe AMY GOODMAN : We turn to a key Bolivian ally, Venezuela. Earlier this month, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was handed his first electoral loss since winning the presidency seven years ago. Chavez narrowly lost a controversial referendum on sixty-nine proposed changes to the constitution. They included measures to eliminate presidential term limits, create forms of communal property and cut the work day from eight to six hours. Turnout was lower than expected.
Addressing his supporters a few days after the election, Chavez conceded defeat in the referendum, said he would leave office in 2012.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHAVEZ : [translated] I have to leave the government in the year 2012. I have to go. You did not approve the reforms. Well, I have to go. I have to go.
AMY GOODMAN : World leaders were largely positive about the election&#8217;s outcome. Many praised President Chavez for respecting the choice of his voters. President Bush used the opportunity to urge a free trade deal with Colombia. But Bolivian President Evo Morales and former Argentine President Nestor Kirchner lauded Chavez for his democratic qualities.
PRESIDENT EVO MORALES : [translated] I respect and value Chavez very much. He&#8217;s democratic. If he were authoritarian, he would impose what he thinks to govern. But his desire is to consider the Venezuelan people, and Venezuelan people make democratic decisions. That must be respected, and here we don’t have to be afraid of a referendum. The people can decide the fate of the country.
NESTOR KIRCHNER : [translated] With the attitude he has had toward Argentina and that today he has lost an election, he&#8217;s shown himself to be a great democrat by accepting the results.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH : The Venezuelan people rejected one-man rule. They voted for democracy. And the United States can make a difference in South America, in terms of Venezuelan influence, and here&#8217;s how: the Congress can pass a free trade agreement with Colombia.
AMY GOODMAN : That was President Bush&#8217;s reaction. Today we host a debate on the constitutional reform referendum held in Venezuela. Gregory Wilpert is with us, editor of the website venezuelanalysis.com , and he&#8217;s author of the book Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government . He is speaking at the Brecht Forum tonight in New York, joining us in our Firehouse studio. We welcome you, Greg Wilpert.
GREGORY WILPERT : Thank you very much.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re also joined on the phone by Francisco Rodriguez, chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly from 2000 to 2004, assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. Francisco Rodriguez joins us on the phone from Middletown, Connecticut. Welcome, Professor Rodriguez. It’s good to have you with us.
Your response &mdash; you are returning to Venezuela; you were just there, Greg &mdash; to what has taken place, the defeat of what Chavez was hoping for, to stay in office longer, although many other provisions, as well, of the constitution got defeated.
GREGORY WILPERT : Well, actually, I think what happened is in many ways an opportunity for the Bolivarian movement. That is, if this reform had actually won, it would have been very likely that the opposition would have launched a number of efforts to destabilize the country, would have launched violent demonstrations and things like that, claiming fraud. There are some rumors that there were T-shirts already printed that claimed fraud. And that would have made actually governing much more difficult for President Chavez.
Now that he lost the referendum, though, he looks much more democratic than people claimed in the past. And so, this is a real opportunity for him to actually implement many of the reforms that were in the constitutional reform, but that don&#8217;t require a constitutional amendment. So, for example, lowering the work week is possible. Introducing a social security fund, introducing nondiscrimination against &mdash;- on the basis of sexual orientation, those kind -&mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : That doesn&#8217;t have to be approved by constitutional amendment?
GREGORY WILPERT : No, many of those things don&#8217;t. And so &mdash; and actually they said that they will implement, for example, one of the first things is the social security fund for self-employed and for informal workers. So he can move ahead with a large part of his agenda with much more social peace in the country.
AMY GOODMAN : Francisco Rodriguez, your response to the defeat of Chavez on these issues and how he accepted them? Professor Rodriguez?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Yes, yes. Hello, I’m sorry. First of all, I think I&#8217;d like to say that I agree that this is a great opportunity for the Chavez administration to be more inclusive, to be more democratic, to finally recognize that there is a large fragment of the population, which indeed in this referendum was a majority of Venezuelan voters, that do not agree with his project of society and to try to call for a government of national unity.
Regrettably, Chavez has been very ambivalent about doing this and very contradictory. It&#8217;s true that he rapidly recognized the results on the night of the election, and that was seen as a good sign by just about everybody, and I believe it was a very good sign. But it’s also true that just a couple of days later, he publicly went on national TV before the armed forces and referred to the opposition victory with an adjective, which is an expletive which I think that we’d have a lot of trouble, actually, if I were to say it on US television. But nevertheless, because of the power of the Venezuelan presidency, in the middle of the day this was carried to all Venezuelan households. There has been, just to give you an example, the Minister of the Interior, Pedro Carreno, made the following statement just a few days ago. He said there is no possible reconciliation, because our project for reconciliation was in the constitutional reforms. So in other words, if we lose, there&#8217;s no reconciliation. So I think that what’s happening is, again, the Venezuelan government, the Chavez administration, has a fundamental discourse that is dividing Venezuelan society between those who are with them and those who are against them. And I think that &mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Professor Rodriguez, you&#8217;re actually comparing Chavez to Bush here? The attitude of, if you are not with us, you are against us?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : I&#8217;m sorry, I did not hear the question.
AMY GOODMAN : I was making a joke, but are you comparing Chavez to Bush here? If you are not with us, you are against us.
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : I did not &mdash; if you’re asking whether I made a particular comparison, I did not. I did say that Chavez has a discourse in which he has many times actually repeated that phrase. If you are not with me, you are against me. If you are voting against the constitutional reform, you are voting for George W. Bush. He made this statement publicly during the campaign. So it’s a very divisive discourse, and it’s a discourse with which the majority of Venezuelan people have shown that they’re not identified. And I don’t think &mdash; I think that if Chavez does not present an inclusive discourse that can include all Venezuelans, then there are going to keep on being problems of governability, and I think that what we’ve seen in the referendum is the first question of that.
AMY GOODMAN : Gregory Wilpert, your response?
GREGORY WILPERT : Well, several things. I mean, for one thing, it’s been often said that Chavez is being contradictory because he was reconciling, being conciliatory, and then qualified the victory of the opposition with this negative adjective. But one has to understand under what circumstances he did that. I mean, he did that because the opposition started arguing that this was &mdash; that they actually had won by a much larger margin than what was made public. And so, Chavez was upset, because this was &mdash; the Venezuelan elections are totally transparent, and there was no shred of evidence or proof of any sort that there was any funny business. But yet, there were a whole bunch of rumors going around and newspaper articles claiming that Chavez negotiated the result to made it look closer than it really was, and so on. And so, he was angry about that, and I think that’s relatively understandable, that, you know, here they are winning and still claiming, oh, we actually won by a much larger margin and they still cheated us, you know, and he was being graceful about the result.
The other thing is, I mean, the whole thing about reconciliation, I’m not really sure what there is often to reconcile about. On the one hand, you have a sector of the opposition that wants to get rid of Chavez by any means necessary, whether it’s violence or whatever, and you cannot reconcile with that. But on the other hand, Chavez has often said, you know, he wants to be more inclusive and wants to &mdash; as long as the opposition plays the democratic game. So far, many times they’ve shown that they’re not. When they are playing the democratic game, I think reconciliation, of course, is always good, and you want democratic debate and participation, but it’s not always possible. And so, that’s why it appears like a contradiction, but you just have to recognize, you know, what’s going on in the specific case.
AMY GOODMAN : Before we wrap up, Greg, you&#8217;ve been living for years in Venezuela. You&#8217;ve come now to the United States. What do you think are the greatest misunderstandings people here have of what’s happening now in Venezuela?
GREGORY WILPERT : Well, I think the greatest misunderstanding is this idea that the Chavez government is non-democratic or something like that. After all, Chavez has won now eleven out of twelve national elections in the past nine years. And the opposition had full freedom of speech. And so, I think this notion that there’s somehow violation of human rights and so on, I think that’s very problematic. I mean, it just doesn’t bear with the facts. On the other hand, there are problems, of course. The government isn’t perfect. And I think one has to recognize some of the problems that exist in Venezuela, but they’re not these kinds of problems that are talked about here usually, which have to do with lack of democracy or lack of human rights.
AMY GOODMAN : What are the problems?
GREGORY WILPERT : Well, I think there’s an overemphasis on the role of Chavez, that is, a very strong concentration of the movement on Chavez, the person. That is a problem. I think it makes criticism within the movement very difficult &mdash; self-reflection. That’s actually one of the good things about the loss of the referendum, is that now it has forced a lot of self-reflection about what is going wrong in the Bolivarian project that previously wasn&#8217;t really possible. So, I mean, that’s one.
And then, there’s, of course, the old tradition in Venezuela of patronage and clientelism, which has continued to some extent in the Chavez presidency, and there&#8217;s not enough recognition of that within the government.
AMY GOODMAN : Finally, Professor Rodriguez, your response?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Oh, yes. I think that there are a set of problems right now in Venezuela, particularly management of the economy is dismal. In the midst of the oil boom, the country actually has rampant inflation. Inflation in the month of November was 4.4%. The scarcity of the basic goods, the primary consumption basket of poor individuals.
I think that you also have to understand that in Venezuela there have been significant amounts of political persecution. The opposition, one of its main goals &mdash; actually, the opposition has supported social security reform and has indeed asked the president to approve it, even before going to the constitutional referendum because a constitutional change was not necessary for it. But the opposition is asking, and I think that a great sign by President Chavez, for the release of political prisoners that are currently held by the Venezuelan government, of prisoners such as former Finance Minister Francisco Uson, who’s in jail for treason for speaking to a TV program about the death of some soldiers. This government published a list of four million, 3.5 million voters who signed for the recall referendum petition. These voters were thrown out of their jobs. They have been persecuted economically. The government itself, Chavez himself has recognized that this happened.
The denunciations that were made in the press, well, when there is a free press, you have to accept that there are going to be rumors published in the press. A very respectable Spanish newspaper, actually, El Mundo , this morning in Spain comes out with a very lengthy report on the military pressures that existed on Chavez to actually recognize the results. So these are quite credible stories, and I think that in a country in which there is a free press, the government should be able to recognize it and discuss these things that are going on.
AMY GOODMAN : Francisco Rodriguez, we’re going to have to leave it there. I want to thank you for being with us, professor at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, and Greg Wilpert, his book is called Changing Venezuela by Taking Power . He heads back to Venezuela this week. AMYGOODMAN:

We turn to a key Bolivian ally, Venezuela. Earlier this month, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was handed his first electoral loss since winning the presidency seven years ago. Chavez narrowly lost a controversial referendum on sixty-nine proposed changes to the constitution. They included measures to eliminate presidential term limits, create forms of communal property and cut the work day from eight to six hours. Turnout was lower than expected.

Addressing his supporters a few days after the election, Chavez conceded defeat in the referendum, said he would leave office in 2012.

PRESIDENTHUGOCHAVEZ: [translated] I have to leave the government in the year 2012. I have to go. You did not approve the reforms. Well, I have to go. I have to go.

AMYGOODMAN:

World leaders were largely positive about the election’s outcome. Many praised President Chavez for respecting the choice of his voters. President Bush used the opportunity to urge a free trade deal with Colombia. But Bolivian President Evo Morales and former Argentine President Nestor Kirchner lauded Chavez for his democratic qualities.

PRESIDENTEVOMORALES: [translated] I respect and value Chavez very much. He’s democratic. If he were authoritarian, he would impose what he thinks to govern. But his desire is to consider the Venezuelan people, and Venezuelan people make democratic decisions. That must be respected, and here we don’t have to be afraid of a referendum. The people can decide the fate of the country.

NESTORKIRCHNER: [translated] With the attitude he has had toward Argentina and that today he has lost an election, he’s shown himself to be a great democrat by accepting the results.

PRESIDENTGEORGE W. BUSH: The Venezuelan people rejected one-man rule. They voted for democracy. And the United States can make a difference in South America, in terms of Venezuelan influence, and here’s how: the Congress can pass a free trade agreement with Colombia.

AMYGOODMAN:

That was President Bush’s reaction. Today we host a debate on the constitutional reform referendum held in Venezuela. Gregory Wilpert is with us, editor of the website venezuelanalysis.com, and he’s author of the book Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government. He is speaking at the Brecht Forum tonight in New York, joining us in our Firehouse studio. We welcome you, Greg Wilpert.

GREGORYWILPERT:

Thank you very much.

AMYGOODMAN:

We’re also joined on the phone by Francisco Rodriguez, chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly from 2000 to 2004, assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. Francisco Rodriguez joins us on the phone from Middletown, Connecticut. Welcome, Professor Rodriguez. It’s good to have you with us.

Your response — you are returning to Venezuela; you were just there, Greg — to what has taken place, the defeat of what Chavez was hoping for, to stay in office longer, although many other provisions, as well, of the constitution got defeated.

GREGORYWILPERT:

Well, actually, I think what happened is in many ways an opportunity for the Bolivarian movement. That is, if this reform had actually won, it would have been very likely that the opposition would have launched a number of efforts to destabilize the country, would have launched violent demonstrations and things like that, claiming fraud. There are some rumors that there were T-shirts already printed that claimed fraud. And that would have made actually governing much more difficult for President Chavez.

Now that he lost the referendum, though, he looks much more democratic than people claimed in the past. And so, this is a real opportunity for him to actually implement many of the reforms that were in the constitutional reform, but that don’t require a constitutional amendment. So, for example, lowering the work week is possible. Introducing a social security fund, introducing nondiscrimination against —- on the basis of sexual orientation, those kind -—

AMYGOODMAN:

That doesn’t have to be approved by constitutional amendment?

GREGORYWILPERT:

No, many of those things don’t. And so — and actually they said that they will implement, for example, one of the first things is the social security fund for self-employed and for informal workers. So he can move ahead with a large part of his agenda with much more social peace in the country.

AMYGOODMAN:

Francisco Rodriguez, your response to the defeat of Chavez on these issues and how he accepted them? Professor Rodriguez?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ:

Yes, yes. Hello, I’m sorry. First of all, I think I’d like to say that I agree that this is a great opportunity for the Chavez administration to be more inclusive, to be more democratic, to finally recognize that there is a large fragment of the population, which indeed in this referendum was a majority of Venezuelan voters, that do not agree with his project of society and to try to call for a government of national unity.

Regrettably, Chavez has been very ambivalent about doing this and very contradictory. It’s true that he rapidly recognized the results on the night of the election, and that was seen as a good sign by just about everybody, and I believe it was a very good sign. But it’s also true that just a couple of days later, he publicly went on national TV before the armed forces and referred to the opposition victory with an adjective, which is an expletive which I think that we’d have a lot of trouble, actually, if I were to say it on US television. But nevertheless, because of the power of the Venezuelan presidency, in the middle of the day this was carried to all Venezuelan households. There has been, just to give you an example, the Minister of the Interior, Pedro Carreno, made the following statement just a few days ago. He said there is no possible reconciliation, because our project for reconciliation was in the constitutional reforms. So in other words, if we lose, there’s no reconciliation. So I think that what’s happening is, again, the Venezuelan government, the Chavez administration, has a fundamental discourse that is dividing Venezuelan society between those who are with them and those who are against them. And I think that —

AMYGOODMAN:

Professor Rodriguez, you’re actually comparing Chavez to Bush here? The attitude of, if you are not with us, you are against us?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ:

I’m sorry, I did not hear the question.

AMYGOODMAN:

I was making a joke, but are you comparing Chavez to Bush here? If you are not with us, you are against us.

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ:

I did not — if you’re asking whether I made a particular comparison, I did not. I did say that Chavez has a discourse in which he has many times actually repeated that phrase. If you are not with me, you are against me. If you are voting against the constitutional reform, you are voting for George W. Bush. He made this statement publicly during the campaign. So it’s a very divisive discourse, and it’s a discourse with which the majority of Venezuelan people have shown that they’re not identified. And I don’t think — I think that if Chavez does not present an inclusive discourse that can include all Venezuelans, then there are going to keep on being problems of governability, and I think that what we’ve seen in the referendum is the first question of that.

AMYGOODMAN:

Gregory Wilpert, your response?

GREGORYWILPERT:

Well, several things. I mean, for one thing, it’s been often said that Chavez is being contradictory because he was reconciling, being conciliatory, and then qualified the victory of the opposition with this negative adjective. But one has to understand under what circumstances he did that. I mean, he did that because the opposition started arguing that this was — that they actually had won by a much larger margin than what was made public. And so, Chavez was upset, because this was — the Venezuelan elections are totally transparent, and there was no shred of evidence or proof of any sort that there was any funny business. But yet, there were a whole bunch of rumors going around and newspaper articles claiming that Chavez negotiated the result to made it look closer than it really was, and so on. And so, he was angry about that, and I think that’s relatively understandable, that, you know, here they are winning and still claiming, oh, we actually won by a much larger margin and they still cheated us, you know, and he was being graceful about the result.

The other thing is, I mean, the whole thing about reconciliation, I’m not really sure what there is often to reconcile about. On the one hand, you have a sector of the opposition that wants to get rid of Chavez by any means necessary, whether it’s violence or whatever, and you cannot reconcile with that. But on the other hand, Chavez has often said, you know, he wants to be more inclusive and wants to — as long as the opposition plays the democratic game. So far, many times they’ve shown that they’re not. When they are playing the democratic game, I think reconciliation, of course, is always good, and you want democratic debate and participation, but it’s not always possible. And so, that’s why it appears like a contradiction, but you just have to recognize, you know, what’s going on in the specific case.

AMYGOODMAN:

Before we wrap up, Greg, you’ve been living for years in Venezuela. You’ve come now to the United States. What do you think are the greatest misunderstandings people here have of what’s happening now in Venezuela?

GREGORYWILPERT:

Well, I think the greatest misunderstanding is this idea that the Chavez government is non-democratic or something like that. After all, Chavez has won now eleven out of twelve national elections in the past nine years. And the opposition had full freedom of speech. And so, I think this notion that there’s somehow violation of human rights and so on, I think that’s very problematic. I mean, it just doesn’t bear with the facts. On the other hand, there are problems, of course. The government isn’t perfect. And I think one has to recognize some of the problems that exist in Venezuela, but they’re not these kinds of problems that are talked about here usually, which have to do with lack of democracy or lack of human rights.

AMYGOODMAN:

What are the problems?

GREGORYWILPERT:

Well, I think there’s an overemphasis on the role of Chavez, that is, a very strong concentration of the movement on Chavez, the person. That is a problem. I think it makes criticism within the movement very difficult — self-reflection. That’s actually one of the good things about the loss of the referendum, is that now it has forced a lot of self-reflection about what is going wrong in the Bolivarian project that previously wasn’t really possible. So, I mean, that’s one.

And then, there’s, of course, the old tradition in Venezuela of patronage and clientelism, which has continued to some extent in the Chavez presidency, and there’s not enough recognition of that within the government.

AMYGOODMAN:

Finally, Professor Rodriguez, your response?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ:

Oh, yes. I think that there are a set of problems right now in Venezuela, particularly management of the economy is dismal. In the midst of the oil boom, the country actually has rampant inflation. Inflation in the month of November was 4.4%. The scarcity of the basic goods, the primary consumption basket of poor individuals.

I think that you also have to understand that in Venezuela there have been significant amounts of political persecution. The opposition, one of its main goals — actually, the opposition has supported social security reform and has indeed asked the president to approve it, even before going to the constitutional referendum because a constitutional change was not necessary for it. But the opposition is asking, and I think that a great sign by President Chavez, for the release of political prisoners that are currently held by the Venezuelan government, of prisoners such as former Finance Minister Francisco Uson, who’s in jail for treason for speaking to a TV program about the death of some soldiers. This government published a list of four million, 3.5 million voters who signed for the recall referendum petition. These voters were thrown out of their jobs. They have been persecuted economically. The government itself, Chavez himself has recognized that this happened.

The denunciations that were made in the press, well, when there is a free press, you have to accept that there are going to be rumors published in the press. A very respectable Spanish newspaper, actually, El Mundo, this morning in Spain comes out with a very lengthy report on the military pressures that existed on Chavez to actually recognize the results. So these are quite credible stories, and I think that in a country in which there is a free press, the government should be able to recognize it and discuss these things that are going on.

AMYGOODMAN:

Francisco Rodriguez, we’re going to have to leave it there. I want to thank you for being with us, professor at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, and Greg Wilpert, his book is called Changing Venezuela by Taking Power. He heads back to Venezuela this week.

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Mon, 17 Dec 2007 00:00:00 -0500Tens of Thousands Protest Chavez Proposals, Is CIA Fomenting Unrest to Challenge Referendum?http://www.democracynow.org/2007/11/30/tens_of_thousands_protest_chavez_proposals
tag:democracynow.org,2007-11-30:en/story/d72b80 JUAN GONZALEZ : In Venezuela, tens of thousands of protesters marched through the capital city of Caracas Thursday to oppose a series of constitutional changes proposed by President Hugo Chavez.
The referendum is coming to a vote on Sunday. Chavez plans to lead rallies in favor of the reforms today. Venezuelans will vote on sixty-nine proposed changes to the nation&#8217;s constitution that include eliminating presidential term limits, creating forms of communal property and cutting the workday from eight hours to six.
Thursday&#8217;s demonstration was the biggest show of opposition to the constitutional overhauls so far. On Wednesday, hundreds of students clashed with police and the Venezuelan national guard. Most surveys say the outcome of the December 2nd vote is too close to call.
AMY GOODMAN : This week, President Chavez claimed the US government is fomenting unrest to challenge the referendum. His foreign minister went on television late Wednesday revealing what he said was a CIA plan to secure a “no” victory. The confidential memo was reportedly sent from the US embassy in Caracas and addressed to the director of Central Intelligence, Michael Hayden.
James Petras is a former professor of sociology and Latin American studies at Binghamton University. He is author of a number of books, including Social Movements and State Power . His exclusive article in “ Counterpunch ” is called &quot;CIA Venezuela Destabilization Memo Surfaces.” Professor Petras joins us now from Binghamton, New York.
Welcome, Professor Petras. Can you start off by talking about what exactly this memo is? Have you actually seen it? What is it reported to say?
JAMES PETRAS : Well, I picked it up off the Venezuelan government program. It describes in some detail what the strategy of the US embassy has been, and most likely the author, Michael Middleton Steere, who’s listed as US embassy, may be a CIA operative, because he sends the report to Michael Hayden, the director of the CIA .
Now, what the memo talks about essentially is, first of all, the effectiveness of their campaign against the constitutional amendments, and it concedes that the amendment will be approved, but it does mention the fact that they’ve reduced the margin of victory by six percentage points. The second part is more interesting. It actually mentions the fact that the US strategy is what they call a “pincer operation.” That’s the name of the document itself. It’s &mdash; “pincer” is “ tenaza ,” and it’s, first of all, to try to undermine the electoral process, the vote itself, and then secondly, once the vote goes through, if they are not able to stop the vote, is to engage in a massive campaign calling fraud and rejecting the outcome that comes from the election. So, on one hand, they&#8217;re calling a no vote, and on the other hand, they&#8217;re denouncing the outcome if they lose.
Now, the other part that’s interesting about this document is what it outlines as the immediate tasks in the last phase. And that includes getting people out in the street, particularly the students. And interestingly enough, there is a mixture here of extreme rightists and some social democrats and even some ex-Maoists and Trotskyists. They mention the Red Flag, Bandera Roja , and praise them actually for their street-fighting ability and causing attacks on public institutions like the electoral tribunal.
But more interestingly is their efforts to intensify their contacts with military offices. And what they seem to have on their agenda is to try to seize either a territorial base or an institutional base around which to rally discontented citizens and call on the military &mdash; and it particularly mentions the National Guard &mdash; to rally in overthrowing the referendum outcome and the government. So this does include a section on a military uprising.
And it complains about the fact that the groups under its umbrella or its partners are not all unified on this strategy, and some have abandoned the umbrella operation and, secondly, that the government intelligence has discovered some of their storage warehouses of armaments and have even picked up some of their operatives. And they hope in this that this is not going to upset their plans.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Well, James Petras, this is obviously a very explosive memo, coming just a few days before the actual referendum. And while it certainly sounds like many of the types of tactics that the CIA has used in prior international adventures, has there been any confirmation whether this memo is &mdash;-
JAMES PETRAS : Well, obviously, it’s a memo that the US will denounce. They always have this clause in their operation that they should be able to have an out.
Secondly, the Venezuelans are very tolerant of their opposition. The Chavez government has not expelled the operative here, Michael Middleton Steere. There have been discussions, I’ve gotten from my sources in Venezuela, in the foreign office to expel this official, but they haven’t actually taken that step. And it goes along with this very libertarian outlook in Venezuelan government. You know, many of the people involved in the overthrow of the president, the military takeover for forty-eight hours in 2002, many of them never were put on trial and never were arrested, and they’re back in action in this referendum. So law enforcement regarding what would normally be called insurrectionary activity in the United States -&mdash; many of these people would have been locked in Fort Leavenworth and the key thrown away &mdash; in Venezuela, the golpistas , the people involved in coup planning and operations, are having a second, third chance.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Let me ask you, in this country, the main focus has been, obviously, in the corporate media on the attempt to do away with term limits for the president. But this is a very extensive major reform of Venezuela&#8217;s laws or its constitution. Could you talk about the various other reforms that are involved in this vote on Sunday?
JAMES PETRAS : Yes. One of them, and probably one that’s going to turn out the biggest votes for Chavez, is the universal social security coverage for many of the street vendors, domestic servants, other people that are in the so-called informal sector, which covers up to 40% of the labor force. So this 40% of the labor force will be covered now by universal social security coverage.
The second thing is the thirty-six-hour work week.
The third is the devolution of community funds directly to local neighborhood organizations and what they call communal councils, which incorporate several neighborhood councils. They will be directly funded by the federal government, instead of the money going through municipal and state governors, where a lot of it is skimmed off the top. So there’s another very positive factor.
It also will facilitate the government&#8217;s ability to expropriate property, especially large areas in the countryside that are now fallow and where you have hundreds of thousands of landless agricultural and small farmers. So it’s a way of facilitating social change.
It also stipulates that the economy will continue to be a mixed economy, with private-public, public-private associations, partnerships, as well as cooperative property. The cooperative property is largely an employment absorption sector. It doesn’t contribute that much to the GNP , but is seen as a way of absorbing the large numbers of people in the unemployment or low-paid sector.
These are some of the major provisions. The government has argued, with some effectiveness, that in the parliamentary systems you have indefinite terms of office. And they mention in the case of England with Tony Blair being reelected as many times as he wanted. They could have cited the President Howard of Australia, who was elected innumerable times. And they cite the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party, which has been in power for the last fifty years, with different prime ministers, but at least an organization with an enormous capacity to be reelected. So they don’t see this as &mdash; they don’t describe this as an unusual happening, much more like a parliamentary system, rather than a presidential system, though in this case &mdash;-
JUAN GONZALEZ : Let me ask you, are there also some protections or new sections of the constitution dealing with racial minorities and also with gender orientation?
JAMES PETRAS : There is guarantees, constitutional guarantees, for women and homosexuals and especially Afro-Venezuelans. Of course, Chavez himself is part-Indian, part-African and part-white. So, essentially, Chavez has made racial equality, not only legally, but in substance, a major point on his agenda. And I would say, in my visits and conversations, that even among his middle&mdash; and upper middle-class opponents, there is definitely a factor here of race. This is going to be not only a class-polarized referendum, but the race issue is prominent, and the right has emphasized the fact that &mdash; in a very hostile way &mdash; that Chavez is of African descent. And they have in the past put caricatures in their publications depicting him as a gorilla. And when Mugabe of Africa, president, visited, they had Chavez and Mugabe walking as if they were two gorillas. And this is national newspaper; this isn’t simply yellow-sheet publications.
AMY GOODMAN : James Petras, we have to take a break, but we’re going to come back to this discussion. Professor James Petrus is a Professor Emeritus of sociology and Latin American studies at Binghamton University in New York. We&#8217;re talking about Venezuela. We’ll also talk about the latest in Bolivia and Chavez negotiating with the rebels in Colombia and Uribe, the Colombian president, cutting that off. This is Democracy Now! Back in a minute.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : Our guest is Professor Emeritus James Petras &mdash; taught at Binghamton University, Latin American studies, in New York &mdash; talking about what’s happening now in Latin America, particularly focusing on Venezuela. Juan?
JUAN GONZALEZ : Yeah. Professor Petras, I’d like to ask you, you’re a longtime respected observer of the developments in Latin America and the left in Latin America. And I have a question about this, the issue of the term limits. Many people who support Chavez are still worried about this attempt to eliminate term limits and create a possible lifetime presidency, in that it seems to once again focus on the individual, rather than on building the kinds of organizations and structures that can, in essence, change a society, transform a society, the emphasis on the cult of the individual, as opposed to building organizations and political parties that will carry on after that leader has gone. Your response to that?
JAMES PETRAS : Well, President Chavez has been very supportive of local organizations. I mentioned these community-based, neighborhood-based organizations. He has also launched a political party, not a single party state, but a party, the party of socialists, Venezuelan Socialist Unity. And so, he’s making big attempts to institutionalize the basis of his policies, and he’s encouraged new trade unions and also peasant organizations.
One of the serious problems is that when Chavez&#8217;s popularity rose, a great many individuals, politicians, jumped on the bandwagon from very diverse backgrounds, from conservatives to Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Marxists, etc. And this has been a problem for two reasons: one, it has eroded internal coherence in their ability to carry through and implement some of the policies that they’ve passed; and second of all, there is a great many people with a career of corruption that have entered into the Chavista movement, particularly in administrative posts.
And Chavez is very aware of this, and he’s aware of the hostility of many of his rank-and-file supporters to many of the especially elected officials in the municipal and even state governments. So he’s assumed political leadership with the support of his mass base in order to counteract some of these internal problems that they have, and it may have unfavorable consequences in the future. But in the short run, it allows for at least some resonance in the executive branch with the popular aspirations.
And this is a very hot issue now, because the government &mdash; not exactly Chavez, but the ministers have not intervened to end the scarcity of some basic commodities. There has been a campaign by retailers and commercial outlets and distributors at hoarding and creating artificial scarcities; despite the fact the government is importing millions and hundreds of millions of dollars in foodstuffs, they&#8217;re not getting onto the shelves.
AMY GOODMAN : Professor Petras, I wanted to ask quickly about Bolivia, the proposed constitutional changes there. On Wednesday, opposition groups staged a general strike in six of Bolivia’s nine provinces against the government-backed changes. Bolivian President Evo Morales says the plans will give Bolivia&#8217;s indigenous and poor communities a greater voice in running the country. The proposals will go before a national referendum in the coming months. This is President Morales speaking from the presidential palace in La Paz.
PRESIDENT EVO MORALES : [translated] I hope that tomorrow morning these five governors are here to have a dialogue. I hope that in five or nine of our departments that we can lay down new social policies together for Bolivia, because this is a government for all Bolivians, not a government for just one sector of them, as some of our companions have said.
AMY GOODMAN : Professor Petras, Bolivia and Evo Morales, do you see similarities with what’s happening in Venezuela?
JAMES PETRAS : No, because Morales has adopted a policy of conciliation with the elites, hoping that he could construct what he calls Andean capitalism, in which there’d be subsidiary benefits for the Indian communities, largely creating greater degrees of autonomy. But the autonomy issue has been taken up by the states, the rightwing states, and it’s become a trampoline for a secessionist movement. And I think these measures of autonomy have been reinterpreted by the extreme right, and they have assumed the leadership in five of the nine provinces. And they&#8217;re heading for a major political and constitutional confrontation.
And let us be absolutely clear what this is all about. The oil and gas wealth is precisely in the states that the right controls, and they are in favor of secession, in which they will control Bolivia’s wealth, even though they may be less than a majority of the population. So this is just like in the United States. This is the equivalent of the Confederates, and they’ve been running roughshod in their states on opposition.
Let me give you just one quick example. They have been assaulting the delegates at a constitutional convention. The government of Morales has not intervened with the military to protect these people. In fact, they&#8217;re holed up now in a military school, where they’re carrying on their constitutional deliberations. And we’ve had other cases of assaults on Indian groups in Santa Cruz, in Beni and other provinces that are associated with the secessionists. And it’s both a racial issue once again, as well as an oil and gas issue, and it’s all hung around the issue of a secession, a white-dominated confederacy in which there will be no land reform. The wealth will continue to be shared between foreign corporations and the oligarchy.
AMY GOODMAN : James Petras, I want to thank you for being with us, Professor Emeritus of sociology and Latin American studies at Binghamton University.
JAMES PETRAS : Keep up your good work, Amy.
AMY GOODMAN : Thanks very &mdash;
JAMES PETRAS : It’s extremely helpful to all of us researchers and scholars and students of Latin American and world affairs.
AMY GOODMAN : Well, thank you for your work, as well, Professor James Petras in Binghamton.JUANGONZALEZ: In Venezuela, tens of thousands of protesters marched through the capital city of Caracas Thursday to oppose a series of constitutional changes proposed by President Hugo Chavez.

The referendum is coming to a vote on Sunday. Chavez plans to lead rallies in favor of the reforms today. Venezuelans will vote on sixty-nine proposed changes to the nation’s constitution that include eliminating presidential term limits, creating forms of communal property and cutting the workday from eight hours to six.

Thursday’s demonstration was the biggest show of opposition to the constitutional overhauls so far. On Wednesday, hundreds of students clashed with police and the Venezuelan national guard. Most surveys say the outcome of the December 2nd vote is too close to call.

AMYGOODMAN: This week, President Chavez claimed the US government is fomenting unrest to challenge the referendum. His foreign minister went on television late Wednesday revealing what he said was a CIA plan to secure a “no” victory. The confidential memo was reportedly sent from the US embassy in Caracas and addressed to the director of Central Intelligence, Michael Hayden.

James Petras is a former professor of sociology and Latin American studies at Binghamton University. He is author of a number of books, including Social Movements and State Power. His exclusive article in “Counterpunch” is called "CIA Venezuela Destabilization Memo Surfaces.” Professor Petras joins us now from Binghamton, New York.

Welcome, Professor Petras. Can you start off by talking about what exactly this memo is? Have you actually seen it? What is it reported to say?

JAMESPETRAS: Well, I picked it up off the Venezuelan government program. It describes in some detail what the strategy of the US embassy has been, and most likely the author, Michael Middleton Steere, who’s listed as US embassy, may be a CIA operative, because he sends the report to Michael Hayden, the director of the CIA.

Now, what the memo talks about essentially is, first of all, the effectiveness of their campaign against the constitutional amendments, and it concedes that the amendment will be approved, but it does mention the fact that they’ve reduced the margin of victory by six percentage points. The second part is more interesting. It actually mentions the fact that the US strategy is what they call a “pincer operation.” That’s the name of the document itself. It’s — “pincer” is “tenaza,” and it’s, first of all, to try to undermine the electoral process, the vote itself, and then secondly, once the vote goes through, if they are not able to stop the vote, is to engage in a massive campaign calling fraud and rejecting the outcome that comes from the election. So, on one hand, they’re calling a no vote, and on the other hand, they’re denouncing the outcome if they lose.

Now, the other part that’s interesting about this document is what it outlines as the immediate tasks in the last phase. And that includes getting people out in the street, particularly the students. And interestingly enough, there is a mixture here of extreme rightists and some social democrats and even some ex-Maoists and Trotskyists. They mention the Red Flag, Bandera Roja, and praise them actually for their street-fighting ability and causing attacks on public institutions like the electoral tribunal.

But more interestingly is their efforts to intensify their contacts with military offices. And what they seem to have on their agenda is to try to seize either a territorial base or an institutional base around which to rally discontented citizens and call on the military — and it particularly mentions the National Guard — to rally in overthrowing the referendum outcome and the government. So this does include a section on a military uprising.

And it complains about the fact that the groups under its umbrella or its partners are not all unified on this strategy, and some have abandoned the umbrella operation and, secondly, that the government intelligence has discovered some of their storage warehouses of armaments and have even picked up some of their operatives. And they hope in this that this is not going to upset their plans.

JUANGONZALEZ: Well, James Petras, this is obviously a very explosive memo, coming just a few days before the actual referendum. And while it certainly sounds like many of the types of tactics that the CIA has used in prior international adventures, has there been any confirmation whether this memo is —-

JAMESPETRAS: Well, obviously, it’s a memo that the US will denounce. They always have this clause in their operation that they should be able to have an out.

Secondly, the Venezuelans are very tolerant of their opposition. The Chavez government has not expelled the operative here, Michael Middleton Steere. There have been discussions, I’ve gotten from my sources in Venezuela, in the foreign office to expel this official, but they haven’t actually taken that step. And it goes along with this very libertarian outlook in Venezuelan government. You know, many of the people involved in the overthrow of the president, the military takeover for forty-eight hours in 2002, many of them never were put on trial and never were arrested, and they’re back in action in this referendum. So law enforcement regarding what would normally be called insurrectionary activity in the United States -— many of these people would have been locked in Fort Leavenworth and the key thrown away — in Venezuela, the golpistas, the people involved in coup planning and operations, are having a second, third chance.

JUANGONZALEZ: Let me ask you, in this country, the main focus has been, obviously, in the corporate media on the attempt to do away with term limits for the president. But this is a very extensive major reform of Venezuela’s laws or its constitution. Could you talk about the various other reforms that are involved in this vote on Sunday?

JAMESPETRAS: Yes. One of them, and probably one that’s going to turn out the biggest votes for Chavez, is the universal social security coverage for many of the street vendors, domestic servants, other people that are in the so-called informal sector, which covers up to 40% of the labor force. So this 40% of the labor force will be covered now by universal social security coverage.

The second thing is the thirty-six-hour work week.

The third is the devolution of community funds directly to local neighborhood organizations and what they call communal councils, which incorporate several neighborhood councils. They will be directly funded by the federal government, instead of the money going through municipal and state governors, where a lot of it is skimmed off the top. So there’s another very positive factor.

It also will facilitate the government’s ability to expropriate property, especially large areas in the countryside that are now fallow and where you have hundreds of thousands of landless agricultural and small farmers. So it’s a way of facilitating social change.

It also stipulates that the economy will continue to be a mixed economy, with private-public, public-private associations, partnerships, as well as cooperative property. The cooperative property is largely an employment absorption sector. It doesn’t contribute that much to the GNP, but is seen as a way of absorbing the large numbers of people in the unemployment or low-paid sector.

These are some of the major provisions. The government has argued, with some effectiveness, that in the parliamentary systems you have indefinite terms of office. And they mention in the case of England with Tony Blair being reelected as many times as he wanted. They could have cited the President Howard of Australia, who was elected innumerable times. And they cite the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party, which has been in power for the last fifty years, with different prime ministers, but at least an organization with an enormous capacity to be reelected. So they don’t see this as — they don’t describe this as an unusual happening, much more like a parliamentary system, rather than a presidential system, though in this case —-

JUANGONZALEZ: Let me ask you, are there also some protections or new sections of the constitution dealing with racial minorities and also with gender orientation?

JAMESPETRAS: There is guarantees, constitutional guarantees, for women and homosexuals and especially Afro-Venezuelans. Of course, Chavez himself is part-Indian, part-African and part-white. So, essentially, Chavez has made racial equality, not only legally, but in substance, a major point on his agenda. And I would say, in my visits and conversations, that even among his middle— and upper middle-class opponents, there is definitely a factor here of race. This is going to be not only a class-polarized referendum, but the race issue is prominent, and the right has emphasized the fact that — in a very hostile way — that Chavez is of African descent. And they have in the past put caricatures in their publications depicting him as a gorilla. And when Mugabe of Africa, president, visited, they had Chavez and Mugabe walking as if they were two gorillas. And this is national newspaper; this isn’t simply yellow-sheet publications.

AMYGOODMAN: James Petras, we have to take a break, but we’re going to come back to this discussion. Professor James Petrus is a Professor Emeritus of sociology and Latin American studies at Binghamton University in New York. We’re talking about Venezuela. We’ll also talk about the latest in Bolivia and Chavez negotiating with the rebels in Colombia and Uribe, the Colombian president, cutting that off. This is Democracy Now! Back in a minute.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: Our guest is Professor Emeritus James Petras — taught at Binghamton University, Latin American studies, in New York — talking about what’s happening now in Latin America, particularly focusing on Venezuela. Juan?

JUANGONZALEZ: Yeah. Professor Petras, I’d like to ask you, you’re a longtime respected observer of the developments in Latin America and the left in Latin America. And I have a question about this, the issue of the term limits. Many people who support Chavez are still worried about this attempt to eliminate term limits and create a possible lifetime presidency, in that it seems to once again focus on the individual, rather than on building the kinds of organizations and structures that can, in essence, change a society, transform a society, the emphasis on the cult of the individual, as opposed to building organizations and political parties that will carry on after that leader has gone. Your response to that?

JAMESPETRAS: Well, President Chavez has been very supportive of local organizations. I mentioned these community-based, neighborhood-based organizations. He has also launched a political party, not a single party state, but a party, the party of socialists, Venezuelan Socialist Unity. And so, he’s making big attempts to institutionalize the basis of his policies, and he’s encouraged new trade unions and also peasant organizations.

One of the serious problems is that when Chavez’s popularity rose, a great many individuals, politicians, jumped on the bandwagon from very diverse backgrounds, from conservatives to Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Marxists, etc. And this has been a problem for two reasons: one, it has eroded internal coherence in their ability to carry through and implement some of the policies that they’ve passed; and second of all, there is a great many people with a career of corruption that have entered into the Chavista movement, particularly in administrative posts.

And Chavez is very aware of this, and he’s aware of the hostility of many of his rank-and-file supporters to many of the especially elected officials in the municipal and even state governments. So he’s assumed political leadership with the support of his mass base in order to counteract some of these internal problems that they have, and it may have unfavorable consequences in the future. But in the short run, it allows for at least some resonance in the executive branch with the popular aspirations.

And this is a very hot issue now, because the government — not exactly Chavez, but the ministers have not intervened to end the scarcity of some basic commodities. There has been a campaign by retailers and commercial outlets and distributors at hoarding and creating artificial scarcities; despite the fact the government is importing millions and hundreds of millions of dollars in foodstuffs, they’re not getting onto the shelves.

AMYGOODMAN: Professor Petras, I wanted to ask quickly about Bolivia, the proposed constitutional changes there. On Wednesday, opposition groups staged a general strike in six of Bolivia’s nine provinces against the government-backed changes. Bolivian President Evo Morales says the plans will give Bolivia’s indigenous and poor communities a greater voice in running the country. The proposals will go before a national referendum in the coming months. This is President Morales speaking from the presidential palace in La Paz.

PRESIDENTEVOMORALES: [translated] I hope that tomorrow morning these five governors are here to have a dialogue. I hope that in five or nine of our departments that we can lay down new social policies together for Bolivia, because this is a government for all Bolivians, not a government for just one sector of them, as some of our companions have said.

AMYGOODMAN: Professor Petras, Bolivia and Evo Morales, do you see similarities with what’s happening in Venezuela?

JAMESPETRAS: No, because Morales has adopted a policy of conciliation with the elites, hoping that he could construct what he calls Andean capitalism, in which there’d be subsidiary benefits for the Indian communities, largely creating greater degrees of autonomy. But the autonomy issue has been taken up by the states, the rightwing states, and it’s become a trampoline for a secessionist movement. And I think these measures of autonomy have been reinterpreted by the extreme right, and they have assumed the leadership in five of the nine provinces. And they’re heading for a major political and constitutional confrontation.

And let us be absolutely clear what this is all about. The oil and gas wealth is precisely in the states that the right controls, and they are in favor of secession, in which they will control Bolivia’s wealth, even though they may be less than a majority of the population. So this is just like in the United States. This is the equivalent of the Confederates, and they’ve been running roughshod in their states on opposition.

Let me give you just one quick example. They have been assaulting the delegates at a constitutional convention. The government of Morales has not intervened with the military to protect these people. In fact, they’re holed up now in a military school, where they’re carrying on their constitutional deliberations. And we’ve had other cases of assaults on Indian groups in Santa Cruz, in Beni and other provinces that are associated with the secessionists. And it’s both a racial issue once again, as well as an oil and gas issue, and it’s all hung around the issue of a secession, a white-dominated confederacy in which there will be no land reform. The wealth will continue to be shared between foreign corporations and the oligarchy.

AMYGOODMAN: James Petras, I want to thank you for being with us, Professor Emeritus of sociology and Latin American studies at Binghamton University.

JAMESPETRAS: Keep up your good work, Amy.

AMYGOODMAN: Thanks very —

JAMESPETRAS: It’s extremely helpful to all of us researchers and scholars and students of Latin American and world affairs.

AMYGOODMAN: Well, thank you for your work, as well, Professor James Petras in Binghamton.]]>

Fri, 30 Nov 2007 00:00:00 -0500EXCLUSIVE: Venezuelan Foreign Minister on Iran Ties, Oil Prices, Biofuels and How the U.S. Media "Tries to Manipulate U.S. Opinion"http://www.democracynow.org/2007/10/2/exclusive_venezuelan_foreign_minister_on_iran
tag:democracynow.org,2007-10-02:en/story/43dd3a JUAN GONZÁLEZ: After Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad&#8217;s controversial visit to the United States last week, he got a more welcome reception in two emerging Latin American allies. Ahmadinejad made brief visits to Bolivia and Venezuela to sign new bilateral accords promoting economic cooperation.
On Thursday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez welcomed Ahmadinejad at the presidential palace. Chávez had praised his handling of the criticism he received from Columbia University President Lee Bollinger.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] An imperial spokesman tried to disrespect you, calling you a small and cruel tyrant. You responded with the high level of the revolutionaries. You responded with the moral force of the brother people of Iran and, even more, with the moral force of the people of the world.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. Ahmadinejad returned the praise.
PRESIDENT MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD : [translated] I reiterate that the Iranian people and the Venezuelan people, with a common force, will be together always on the world scenes, and imperialism has no other option and must respect the peoples or accept defeat.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Venezuela and Iran share a common foe in the White House. It&#8217;s been five years since the U.S. backed a coup that briefly removed Chávez from office. Chávez&#8217;s popularity remains strong. He was re-elected one year ago with 60 percent support, his largest victory so far.
We&#8217;re joined for the rest of the hour by Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro Moros. He is in New York for the annual gathering of world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly. He is scheduled to address the General Assembly this afternoon.
AMY GOODMAN : In this Democracy Now! exclusive, Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro Moros joins us here in the firehouse studio.
Why is President Chávez not addressing the U.N. General Assembly?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] First of all, I&#8217;d like to thank you for this opportunity to communicate with the U.S. viewers.
Chief of state, chief of government, head of government, are always very busy, and they are not able to attend every year to this meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. In the past, President Chávez has been able to attend. This year, however, he has had a very busy agenda in tackling social and economic problems and also tackling the democratic constitutional reform that is being conducted in the country and prevented him from attending directly these meetings. However, he is always following very closely the debates that take place here and participating in different debates from Caracas and in the different places where he is deploying his leadership.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, at last year&#8217;s General Assembly, the statements of President Chávez got huge attention and negative publicity here in the United States, his criticism of President Bush. This year, it was the president of Iran who became the big focus. Your country&#8217;s view of now how Iran is being viewed by both the American press and the American government?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] There is a total control by the U.S. media network in this very moment. The repercussion of President Chávez&#8217;s last year was one thing on the streets and another thing, what happened in the media. And we have the evidence how it had an impact, and it had an impact on the people of the United States that considered itself represented, how its sentiment of rejection to the warmongering attitude of the U.S. government it was reflected in the speech by President Hugo Chávez.
This time, there was also a very hard attacked against President Ahmadinejad before attending the meeting in the U.N. during his stay in New York. And there&#8217;s been an attempt to continue this harsh attack after he left, once he left.
We are going through historic debate in mankind. There is a quest, and the U.S. society is part of this quest, despite the fact that the media tried to control, to manipulate U.S. opinion, public opinion, from the grassroots, the recent increasing awareness of what is going on around the world.
AMY GOODMAN : Can you talk about the significance of Ahmadinejad coming to Venezuela? First, he went to La Paz, Bolivia &mdash; he met with President Morales, promising a large $1.1 billion, I think, cooperation deal &mdash; then to Venezuela. Is Iran and Venezuela forming a kind of counter bloc to the United States?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] I think Iran, Venezuela and many other Asian countries, African countries, Latin American countries, we agree to a huge alliance for social development, for peace. For instance, in the case of the bilateral relations between Iran and Venezuela, these relations has allowed Venezuelans to make progress in the construction of a productive economic model. With the Iranian technology, we have created south of Venezuela a factory to manufacture tractors for agricultural production. This did not happen in the past. Today, Venezuela is producing tractors for its own agricultural development, and it has allowed us to sell and send tractors to our friends in Nicaragua, Bolivia and in the Caribbean. Venezuela, together with Iran, with technology, Iranian technology, we have built factories to process food, so our country can be self-sufficient and to reach food security in the manufacturing of food products. So we have a very productive relation with Iran, in regarding economic development, technology transfer. And the main focus of this is to overcome poverty.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But in the process of that fight against poverty, there are obviously big differences still in that growing alliance. For instance, both President Morales of Bolivia and President Chávez have opposed the whole move toward biofuels, whereas President Lula in Brazil is expanding his country&#8217;s involvement and his work with the United States over the issue of biofuels. Could you talk about those differences?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] That&#8217;s an important issue, and there is an open debate on this issue, regarding the need to create a comprehensive energy matrix to build energy security for the next hundred years for South America and the Caribbean regions. In this regard, we have made huge progress with the creation of Petrocaribe, and 14 Caribbean countries are part of this scheme, allowing them to make huge progress to build a sustainable energy security into the same thing, South America. With the creation of the Union of South American Nations, we have &mdash; we want to sign an energy security treaty.
Now, regarding biofuels, we agree in private and in public with the position of Brazil and the position of other brothers and sisters from South America, in the sense that this is a delicate matter, and this should be dealt with in a very thorough and careful manner. We consider that we have to modify the consumerism, the consumption model that&#8217;s been imposed around the world. With this consumerism of the last 50 years, well, there&#8217;s been a destruction of the planet as never before, and we have reached the limit of what the earth can withstand. And this has led to climate change, and this is threatening the survival of the human species.
And so, to cure the illness, we are proposing a very dangerous medicine to produce gasoline for cars, preventing human beings from eating. I mean, what is going on with corn is awful. The increase in the price of land to grow corn increases the price of corn, and we have removed the corn from the dish of Latin American people, poor people, to process this corn to be used as to feed the cows. And this is a criminal attitude. And this debate that is all over the world, well, this should clarify and pave the way towards alternative fuel for the future. It is clear that we need alternative fuels to hydrocarbons, but these alternative fuels cannot jeopardize the food balance in the world.
AMY GOODMAN : Can you talk about President Chávez negotiating between the Colombian government and the FARC to free the hostages &mdash; three of them are American &mdash; and his call to President Bush to participate in this?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] Yes. A week ago, President Chávez welcomed the relatives of three U.S. citizens who are hostages in the hands of the FARC , the guerrilla movement in Colombia. This was a very emotional meeting, indeed, because even the sons or the children of one of these U.S. citizens, they didn&#8217;t know the grandparents and the other siblings living in Florida. So this ratified the commitment of President Chávez to make progress in the mediation process and to try to find a way for the humanitarian agreement in exchange, and these citizens can go back home. This is not an easy path to follow. It takes a lot of patience and hard work, a lot of prudence. And President Chávez is fully committed to be useful, to support, to help as much as possible with the great commitment, human commitment, to help the relatives of those who are being detained in the Colombian forest, but also to open the path to a comprehensive exchange in Colombia.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I&#8217;d like to ask you about the oil situation. The price of oil has been obviously going up dramatically, and President Chávez is on record as saying he believes it should go higher, possibly as high as $100 a barrel of oil. What is going on within OPEC on this? And also, why is he taking this stand?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] Well, President Chávez has warned over the last five years of what might happen if we continue on this path of war and destabilization of the Middle East. And he has warned that if we continue on the path of violence and destabilization taken by the U.S. government, then this could lead to a price of a barrel of $100. That&#8217;s what he has said, and he has said so for over the last five years or so.
And the analysis conducted by President Chávez has been proven by reality. The price of oil is increasing for different reasons: first of all, because of the war in Iraq and the destabilization and destruction resulting from this war; second, because of the increase of consumption of hydrocarbons in the world as a result of increase of consumption in Europe and the U.S. society and the new pools of development, such as India and China; and third, because of the lack of investments in refining within the United States. There&#8217;s a number of factors that has led to the level of price we know today. However, we might say that the major factor has been the war on Iraq and the crazy politics to destroy.
AMY GOODMAN : Mr. Maduro, you&#8217;re about to speak before the U.N. General Assembly. We just have a little amount of time. Last year, President Chávez said, &quot;The devil came here yesterday; it smells like sulfur today.&quot; What is your message?
NICOLÁS MADURO MOROS : [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what&#8217;s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.
Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it&#8217;s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That&#8217;s the main message, and that&#8217;s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro Moros, thank you very much for joining us. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: After Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s controversial visit to the United States last week, he got a more welcome reception in two emerging Latin American allies. Ahmadinejad made brief visits to Bolivia and Venezuela to sign new bilateral accords promoting economic cooperation.

On Thursday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez welcomed Ahmadinejad at the presidential palace. Chávez had praised his handling of the criticism he received from Columbia University President Lee Bollinger.

PRESIDENTHUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] An imperial spokesman tried to disrespect you, calling you a small and cruel tyrant. You responded with the high level of the revolutionaries. You responded with the moral force of the brother people of Iran and, even more, with the moral force of the people of the world.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. Ahmadinejad returned the praise.

PRESIDENTMAHMOUDAHMADINEJAD: [translated] I reiterate that the Iranian people and the Venezuelan people, with a common force, will be together always on the world scenes, and imperialism has no other option and must respect the peoples or accept defeat.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Venezuela and Iran share a common foe in the White House. It’s been five years since the U.S. backed a coup that briefly removed Chávez from office. Chávez’s popularity remains strong. He was re-elected one year ago with 60 percent support, his largest victory so far.

We’re joined for the rest of the hour by Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro Moros. He is in New York for the annual gathering of world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly. He is scheduled to address the General Assembly this afternoon.

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] First of all, I’d like to thank you for this opportunity to communicate with the U.S. viewers.

Chief of state, chief of government, head of government, are always very busy, and they are not able to attend every year to this meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. In the past, President Chávez has been able to attend. This year, however, he has had a very busy agenda in tackling social and economic problems and also tackling the democratic constitutional reform that is being conducted in the country and prevented him from attending directly these meetings. However, he is always following very closely the debates that take place here and participating in different debates from Caracas and in the different places where he is deploying his leadership.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, at last year’s General Assembly, the statements of President Chávez got huge attention and negative publicity here in the United States, his criticism of President Bush. This year, it was the president of Iran who became the big focus. Your country’s view of now how Iran is being viewed by both the American press and the American government?

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] There is a total control by the U.S. media network in this very moment. The repercussion of President Chávez’s last year was one thing on the streets and another thing, what happened in the media. And we have the evidence how it had an impact, and it had an impact on the people of the United States that considered itself represented, how its sentiment of rejection to the warmongering attitude of the U.S. government it was reflected in the speech by President Hugo Chávez.

This time, there was also a very hard attacked against President Ahmadinejad before attending the meeting in the U.N. during his stay in New York. And there’s been an attempt to continue this harsh attack after he left, once he left.

We are going through historic debate in mankind. There is a quest, and the U.S. society is part of this quest, despite the fact that the media tried to control, to manipulate U.S. opinion, public opinion, from the grassroots, the recent increasing awareness of what is going on around the world.

AMYGOODMAN: Can you talk about the significance of Ahmadinejad coming to Venezuela? First, he went to La Paz, Bolivia — he met with President Morales, promising a large $1.1 billion, I think, cooperation deal — then to Venezuela. Is Iran and Venezuela forming a kind of counter bloc to the United States?

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] I think Iran, Venezuela and many other Asian countries, African countries, Latin American countries, we agree to a huge alliance for social development, for peace. For instance, in the case of the bilateral relations between Iran and Venezuela, these relations has allowed Venezuelans to make progress in the construction of a productive economic model. With the Iranian technology, we have created south of Venezuela a factory to manufacture tractors for agricultural production. This did not happen in the past. Today, Venezuela is producing tractors for its own agricultural development, and it has allowed us to sell and send tractors to our friends in Nicaragua, Bolivia and in the Caribbean. Venezuela, together with Iran, with technology, Iranian technology, we have built factories to process food, so our country can be self-sufficient and to reach food security in the manufacturing of food products. So we have a very productive relation with Iran, in regarding economic development, technology transfer. And the main focus of this is to overcome poverty.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But in the process of that fight against poverty, there are obviously big differences still in that growing alliance. For instance, both President Morales of Bolivia and President Chávez have opposed the whole move toward biofuels, whereas President Lula in Brazil is expanding his country’s involvement and his work with the United States over the issue of biofuels. Could you talk about those differences?

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] That’s an important issue, and there is an open debate on this issue, regarding the need to create a comprehensive energy matrix to build energy security for the next hundred years for South America and the Caribbean regions. In this regard, we have made huge progress with the creation of Petrocaribe, and 14 Caribbean countries are part of this scheme, allowing them to make huge progress to build a sustainable energy security into the same thing, South America. With the creation of the Union of South American Nations, we have — we want to sign an energy security treaty.

Now, regarding biofuels, we agree in private and in public with the position of Brazil and the position of other brothers and sisters from South America, in the sense that this is a delicate matter, and this should be dealt with in a very thorough and careful manner. We consider that we have to modify the consumerism, the consumption model that’s been imposed around the world. With this consumerism of the last 50 years, well, there’s been a destruction of the planet as never before, and we have reached the limit of what the earth can withstand. And this has led to climate change, and this is threatening the survival of the human species.

And so, to cure the illness, we are proposing a very dangerous medicine to produce gasoline for cars, preventing human beings from eating. I mean, what is going on with corn is awful. The increase in the price of land to grow corn increases the price of corn, and we have removed the corn from the dish of Latin American people, poor people, to process this corn to be used as to feed the cows. And this is a criminal attitude. And this debate that is all over the world, well, this should clarify and pave the way towards alternative fuel for the future. It is clear that we need alternative fuels to hydrocarbons, but these alternative fuels cannot jeopardize the food balance in the world.

AMYGOODMAN: Can you talk about President Chávez negotiating between the Colombian government and the FARC to free the hostages — three of them are American — and his call to President Bush to participate in this?

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] Yes. A week ago, President Chávez welcomed the relatives of three U.S. citizens who are hostages in the hands of the FARC, the guerrilla movement in Colombia. This was a very emotional meeting, indeed, because even the sons or the children of one of these U.S. citizens, they didn’t know the grandparents and the other siblings living in Florida. So this ratified the commitment of President Chávez to make progress in the mediation process and to try to find a way for the humanitarian agreement in exchange, and these citizens can go back home. This is not an easy path to follow. It takes a lot of patience and hard work, a lot of prudence. And President Chávez is fully committed to be useful, to support, to help as much as possible with the great commitment, human commitment, to help the relatives of those who are being detained in the Colombian forest, but also to open the path to a comprehensive exchange in Colombia.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I’d like to ask you about the oil situation. The price of oil has been obviously going up dramatically, and President Chávez is on record as saying he believes it should go higher, possibly as high as $100 a barrel of oil. What is going on within OPEC on this? And also, why is he taking this stand?

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] Well, President Chávez has warned over the last five years of what might happen if we continue on this path of war and destabilization of the Middle East. And he has warned that if we continue on the path of violence and destabilization taken by the U.S. government, then this could lead to a price of a barrel of $100. That’s what he has said, and he has said so for over the last five years or so.

And the analysis conducted by President Chávez has been proven by reality. The price of oil is increasing for different reasons: first of all, because of the war in Iraq and the destabilization and destruction resulting from this war; second, because of the increase of consumption of hydrocarbons in the world as a result of increase of consumption in Europe and the U.S. society and the new pools of development, such as India and China; and third, because of the lack of investments in refining within the United States. There’s a number of factors that has led to the level of price we know today. However, we might say that the major factor has been the war on Iraq and the crazy politics to destroy.

AMYGOODMAN: Mr. Maduro, you’re about to speak before the U.N. General Assembly. We just have a little amount of time. Last year, President Chávez said, "The devil came here yesterday; it smells like sulfur today." What is your message?

NICOLÁS MADUROMOROS: [translated] Our message is a message, first of all, to draw a balance of what has happened over the last months in the world, what happened in the world, what’s been the role of the United Nations to guarantee peace, how much the world has lost as a result of this crazy policy that apparently will be prolonged with this attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran. It could reach a crazy level if we pretend to take the way of war to aggress, to attack the Iranian people.

Our message remains the same. The world should open their eyes. The U.S. society should react. The U.S. people can do a lot for peace, for stability in the planet, for the recovery of the planet. The awareness in the world today, it’s also expressed in the United States, and we need a large humane alliance between the U.S. people and the peoples of the world, respecting our diversity, cultural diversity, our different ways to see the world, and establishing a relationship of equality. That’s the main message, and that’s been the message of President Chávez a year ago.

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Tue, 02 Oct 2007 00:00:00 -0400Chavez Shuts Down Venezuelan TV Station as Supporters, Opponents Rally: A Debate on the Closing of RCTVhttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/5/31/chavez_shuts_down_venezuelan_tv_station
tag:democracynow.org,2007-05-31:en/story/a494c1 JUAN GONZALEZ : In Venezuela, thousands of people have taken to the streets in four days of protest and counterprotest over the closing of TV network Radio Caracas Television, or RCTV . The Venezuelan government decided not to renew RCTV&#8217;s television license earlier this year. Police, protesters and government supporters have clashed violently in Caracas since Sunday, and scores of people have been arrested.
President Hugo Chavez&#8217;s decision to close RCTV , Venezuela&#8217;s oldest private television network, has received international condemnation, including from the European Union, press freedom groups, Chile and the United States.
The Venezuelan government says it canceled RCTV over its support for the coup that briefly overthrew President Chavez five years ago. At the time, RCTV and other opposition TV channels openly supported the coup. In a national address on Monday, Chavez defended his decision to close RCTV , denouncing it as &quot;a permanent attack on public morals.&quot; He also called news network Globovision an enemy of the state and criticized its coverage of the protest against RCTV&#8217;s closure.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHAVEZ : [translated] What Globovision did last night was an open and clear indication that they would kill me. Well, people of Globovision, I&#8217;m going to alert you in front of the country on the national chain of radio and television: I recommend that you take a tranquilizer, because, if not, I am going to do what is necessary.
JUAN GONZALEZ : On Monday, Venezuela&#8217;s government announced it was suing Globovision for allegedly broadcasting material to incite a possible assassination of Chavez. It also accused U.S. news network CNN of linking him to al-Qaeda. Globovision and CNN have both denied the claims.
AMY GOODMAN : RCTV&#8217;s general manager, Marcel Granier, has described the closure as &quot;abusive&quot; and &quot;arbitrary.&quot; The Venezuelan government refused to renew its license on the grounds it conspired against Chavez during the 2002 coup, including broadcasting footage falsely blaming Chavez supporters for violence, applauding coup leaders as they overthrew the government, and then refusing to report that Chavez had returned to power following mass protest.
In a moment, we&#8217;ll have a debate on this issue. But first, let&#8217;s turn to an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the 2002 coup. The film is called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised .
NARRATOR : One in four Venezuelans carry handguns, and soon some of the Chavez supporters began to shoot back in the direction the sniper fire seemed to be coming from.
ANDRES IZARRA : [translated] One of the channels had a camera opposite the palace. They captured images of people shooting from the bridge. It looks like they&#8217;re shooting at the opposition march below, but you can see they, themselves, are ducking. They are clearly being shot at, but the shots of them ducking were never shown. The Chavez supporters were blamed. The images were manipulated and shown over and over again to say that Chavez supporters had assassinated innocent marchers.
PRIVATE TV CHANNEL COVERAGE : [translated] Look at that Chavez supporter. Look at him empty his gun. That Chavez supporter has just fired on unarmed peaceful protesters below, peaceful protesters who are totally unarmed.
NARRATOR : What the TV stations didn&#8217;t broadcast was this camera angle, which clearly shows that the streets below were empty. The opposition march had never taken that route. With this manipulation, the deaths could now be blamed on Chavez.
AMY GOODMAN : An excerpt of the documentary, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised , by filmmakers Kim Bartley and Donnacha O&#8217;Briain. That clip featured an interview with Andres Izarra, a news manager with RCTV during the 2002 coup. He later quit the station in protest over its coverage. After break, he will join us in debate with a Wesleyan professor over the closing of RCTV , the Wesleyan professor Francisco Rodriguez, professor of Latin American studies in Connecticut. Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : Joining us from Caracas, Venezuela, is Andres Izarra, who quit RCTV , later served as Venezuela&#8217;s communications minister under President Chavez and is now president of TeleSUR, the multinational satellite network launched by Venezuela, Argentina, Bolivia and Cuba. And on the phone with us from Connecticut, Francisco Rodriguez, an assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University, former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. We welcome you both to Democracy Now!
Let&#8217;s begin with Andres Izarra in Venezuela. Why did President Chavez shut down RCTV ?
ANDRES IZARRA : President Chavez hasn&#8217;t shut down any TV station. The concession has expired after 53 years, and the government decided not to renew the concession, because it needed to develop a national public service television. There is no shutdown at all.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And could you talk a little bit about the time that you were news director at RCTV at the time of the coup and the reason for your initial resignation and your concerns about RCTV&#8217;s news coverage?
ANDRES IZARRA : RCTV , during the 2002 coup d&#8217;etat in Venezuela, was a factor aligned with the interests of the dictatorship that was installed in our country for 48 hours. It is no secret, not just with RCTV , but all the other private media, radio and television, were aligned in promoting the protests and the whole process that led to the incarceration of President Chavez during this brief period of time. And the censorship that was imposed on all of us journalists during those days in the effort of the private TV and radio stations to legitimize the dictatorship in Venezuela, it was a censorship that was imposed on us in an effort to try to legitimize this dictatorship. We could not broadcast any of the people&#8217;s reaction to the decree and to the dictator Carmona. And we could not cover anything that was happening in Venezuela, because instead of spreading the news of what was going on, the broadcast stations were broadcasting telenovelas , soap operas and cartoons.
AMY GOODMAN : We want to bring in Francisco Rodriguez, assistant professor at Wesleyan University, former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. Your response to RCTV&#8217;s closing?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Yes, well, I think that I am actually quite surprised that Mr. Izarra says that RCTV is not being closed down. It&#8217;s the nation&#8217;s oldest private TV station. It&#8217;s been operating since the &#39;50s. It&#39;s the nation&#8217;s most widely viewed TV station. And it&#8217;s very clear that the government is going against it because it doesn&#8217;t follow the government line, it has a very much of a pro-opposition stance.
Now, the government, as Mr. Izarra said, has charged it with supporting the coup. Now, in a democracy, usually it is not sufficient for somebody to be accused of committing a crime in order for the government to be able to take action against them. In a democracy, when somebody is believed to have conspired against the government, they have the right to defend themselves in court. They&#8217;re taken to a court of law. And only after a court has said they are guilty is it that the executive power can actually take some measure against them. So, effectively, if Mr. Izarra or Mr. Chavez have proof that RCTV conspired against the government in the coup, well, why haven&#8217;t they taken it to court? No Venezuelan court has decided that RCTV has violated any law.
And it&#8217;s actually very striking that Mr. Izarra just said that all other private media also were not transmitting the story in a view &mdash; during the April 2002 coup, were not transmitting the views of the Chavez supporters. Now, that&#8217;s very interesting, and I think that that, by and large, is true. Now, what&#8217;s interesting is that some of those media, which Mr. Izarra has just said, were doing the same thing as RCTV , have just had their concessions renewed. So, for example, Venevision has just had its concession renewed. Why, if there&#8217;s no difference between what Venevision did and what RCTV did, is RCTV&#8217;s concession revoked and Venevision&#8217;s concession renewed? Well, the reason is that Venevision now has an editorial line which is very favorable to the government. Venezuelans joke at Venevision, calling it &quot;Venezolana de Venevision,&quot; which is a play on words that makes its name almost indistinguishable from that of the government TV station.
So, effectively, what the government is doing is that it&#8217;s using licenses and it&#8217;s using a set of other economic means, such as foreign exchange allegations, blacklisting of government opponents &mdash; the government has published a list of 3.5 million people who signed the recall referendum against them, against the government, to intimidate them &mdash; and it&#8217;s using all of these means to try to quash out dissent in Venezuela. I think that&#8217;s what&#8217;s happening. And basically, I think we&#8217;re looking at the breakdown of democracy in Venezuela.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Professor Rodriquez, when you mention about how democracy functions, my understanding is that in Venezuela there really is no &mdash; and this predates the Chavez government &mdash; that there is really no process by which a television company can appeal the revocation of their license, that basically it is an executive decision of the government whether you have the privilege of holding a license, very similar to &mdash; at least here in the United States, there&#8217;s an FCC that fines stations quite often and can take away a license for failure to serve in the public interest, although clearly there&#8217;s a court procedure here in the United States, but that the Venezuelan legal system does not provide that kind of appeal process for television stations. Is that accurate?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Sure, but there are a set of international agreements also, which have been signed by the Venezuelan government, which specify that these mechanisms, such as the renewal of licenses, such as the use of taxation or the allocation of foreign exchange, cannot be used in a way in which they are geared towards trying to change the opinion or the messages that are being transmitted by these TV stations. So they can&#8217;t be used to interfere with the freedom of speech.
So what is effectively and obviously happening here in Venezuela and is transparent in the declarations of Mr. Izarra and all of the government supporters is that RCTV is being punished for its editorial line. And there, we get into an issue where there&#8217;s a violation of the freedom of speech and where effectively the government is using its force not to regulate the broadcasting system, but actually to make it have an opinion and voice opinions which are favorable to it. And that, I think, is where we see the breakdown of democracy occurring.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Mr. Izarra, your response to the position of the professor that you&#8217;re, in essence, punishing one network, whereas other networks also supposedly participated or supported the coup attempt?
ANDRES IZARRA : Well, I cannot speak on behalf of Venevision and where their editorial line is. I can only speak about TeleSUR. And we have been covering all sides of the events during all these days. Even the head of now the opposition, which is Globovision, the head of Globovision was on our air just yesterday exposing what their views were. I don&#8217;t know what Venevision is doing. I cannot speak on their behalf. But I can really say that this is a matter of sovereignty, and this is just an administrative procedure. In the past, we&#8217;ve seen in France, for example, the French government revoked the license for Berlusconi, when he was operating Tele 5, and gave it to another operator. Well, the same thing is happening here, just that in this case we&#8217;re not renewing a license.
There is no political &mdash; how do you say that? &mdash; punishment being imposed on RCTV because of their editorial line. In fact, 78 percent of the concessions in VHF in Venezuela are in private hands, most of them aligned with the opposition. Eighty-two percent of the concessions in the UHF spectrum are also in private hands, also most of them aligned with the opposition. So what we have here, again, is just an administrative procedure that is being used with political purpose to advance another coup d&#8217;etat. There&#8217;s another coup d&#8217;etat effort on the way in Venezuela, just like we had in the past.
I must remind you, the 64 days of oil sabotage that happened in our country, where the oil elite stopped oil production in Venezuela, supported by this private media. I must remind you that RCTV broadcast during 64 days thousands and thousands of TV spots, not commercials, only political messages, to take out of the government a legitimate and democratically elected government. If you have such an irresponsible operator doing what RCTV has been doing in our country for over five years, that license would be revoked immediately. If you have a private media being involved in the coup d&#8217;etat, like you had it happening in Venezuela, you would see, for sure, that channel taken off the air in the United States and its owners being put in jail.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re talking to Andres Izarra. He&#8217;s in Caracas, Venezuela, our first live national broadcast, video and audio, directly from Caracas. I apologize a bit for the sound. It sounds like there&#8217;s a bit of a rainstorm there, but it doesn&#8217;t look like that, though it looks maybe a little overcast. He is the president of TeleSUR. We&#8217;re also joined by Professor Rodriguez from Wesleyan University.
Andres Izarra, just looking at thestar.com , the latest piece out of Reuters, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez calling opposition news channel Globovision an enemy of the state, saying he would do what&#8217;s needed to stop it from inciting violence only days after he shut another opposition broadcaster. It quotes Hugo Chavez saying that. Going on to say, &quot;Tens of thousands of Venezuelans marched in Caracas in a fourth consecutive day of protests over Chavez&#8217;s closure of [the] RCTV [network].&quot; State TV &quot;showed hundreds of government supporters marching in downtown Caracas celebrating Chavez&#8217;s decision. &#39;Enemies of the homeland, particularly those behind the scenes, I will give you a name: Globovision. Greetings, gentlemen of Globovision, you should watch where you are going,&#39; Chavez said in a broadcast all channels had to show.&quot; He said, &quot;&#39;I recommend you take a tranquillizer and get into gear, because if not, I am going to do what is necessary.&#39; He accused Globovision of trying to incite his assassination and of misreporting protests over the closure of RCTV that could whip up a situation similar to the coup attempt [against him] in 2002.&quot; Andres Izarra, your response to that Reuters report?
ANDRES IZARRA : Well, we have seen Globovision inciting the death of the president. I would like to see what would happen if NBC or CBS would broadcast what Globovision shows here, not just openly calling the people to rebel. In this very small opposition protest led by different, especially middle-class and upper-class students from private universities in Caracas and in the east of Caracas, which is the wealthiest part of the city, I would like to see how the FCC response would be for a broadcaster like Globovision that is constantly promoting rebellion and destabilization and has been supporting all anti-democratic processes and pronouncements here in Venezuela. The latest thing we&#8217;ve had is a clear, open call for the assassination of the president during one of their most vitriolic anti-Chavez shows called Alo Ciudadano .
JUAN GONZALEZ : Professor Rodriguez, I&#8217;d like to ask you, looking at it from our perspective here in this country, if some networks here in this country, NBC or ABC , fomented the kind of public opposition that RCTV or Globovision have against the current administration, do you think that the government would be justified in acting against them?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Well, I think it&#8217;s very important to talk about exactly what it is that they&#8217;re doing. And as I &mdash; first of all, as I started out saying at the beginning, I think that there has to be a judicial review, there has to be presentation of the proof against these networks that shows that they have indeed fomented opposition.
Now, let&#8217;s talk about, Mr. Izarra just mentioned, openly calling for the overthrow of the government, Globovision, during the Alo Ciudadano program. Let&#8217;s see what they did. Globovision transmitted a set of images from the history of Venezuela and the world, basically which were &mdash; it was indeed a review, after more than 50 years of transmitting, what RCTV &mdash; all of the events that they had been present in. And one of the images &mdash; and this was in a set of different historical images that they presented &mdash; was an image of the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II. And according to Minister of Communications William Lara, a group of expert semioticians &mdash; I&#8217;m not joking; this was as it was reported in The New York Times &mdash; a group of expert semioticians working in the Ministry of Communications actually have identified that the transmission of the historical video of the assassination attempt of Pope John Paul II was indeed a call to carry out an assassination attempt against Mr. Chavez. Now, anybody who believes that in a profoundly Catholic country, such as Venezuela, you are going to actually incite people to go out and kill Mr. Chavez by presenting an image of an assassination attempt against the pope is certainly clearly out of their mind.
So this is the type of evidence that the government presents against Globovision, against Radio Caracas, and at the same time, you know, you have a set of other cases, where in the government TV stations you also routinely have &mdash; and the government-owned TV stations, are completely used to propagate pro-government messages, messages &mdash; you turn on the government TV station and you see pro-Chavez slogans being chanted all of the time, not effectively respecting the difference between the fact that this TV station is property of the state and not of the government. But definitely the government feels that it has the right to do that. So, essentially, I think that &mdash; you know, in answer to your question, I think that if a TV station were to actually call for the overthrow of the government and you can prove that in court, you would have a very strong case. It turns out that when the government has actually tried to prove these things in court, even the largely favorable supreme court, actually, ended up throwing out the government&#8217;s case against military command [inaudible] for open rebellion. So the government has really had a hard time. And when one sees the type of proof that they&#8217;re presenting, one is not surprised.
AMY GOODMAN : Andres Izarra, your final response?
ANDRES IZARRA : Oh, yeah. He&#8217;s absolutely right. It is hard to &mdash; in this country, oddest things had happened here. What was a clear coup d&#8217;etat &mdash; everyone recognizes internationally, domestically, everyone knew what happened in 2002 &mdash; our courts decided that it was not a coup. It was a power vacuum that was portrayed by military men who had good intentions and were protecting the president, never a coup d&#8217;etat happened in Venezuela. So Mr. Rodriguez is right. We have a very tough problem, very strong problem here with the courts, who have not even recognized that there had been a coup d&#8217;etat here in Venezuela.
But in terms of &mdash; Mr. Rodriguez is an economist, so these economists have a very linear way of thinking, you know. If you show the images of Pope John Paul II when he was &mdash; his assassination attempt &mdash; and you put a music saying, &quot;Everything has its end. People, go look for the end,&quot; and in a context where you are reporting on all this vitriolic chants against the government and calls for to rebel against the government and denounce a dictatorship, that simple historic image gets a new context, and the message gets a very clear direction. You people, who are broadcasting, who are communications people, know very well how images can be manipulated and can be used to promote a sense and to promote a line of thought and feelings among the people.
AMY GOODMAN : Andres Izarra, we will have to leave it there. Andres Izarra speaking to us live from Caracas, Venezuela, manager at RCTV during the 2002 coup &mdash; he quit at the time &mdash; now president of TeleSUR, the multinational satellite network launched by Venezuela, Argentina, Bolivia and Cuba. Francisco Rodriguez, joining us from Wesleyan, assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at the Connecticut school, he is former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. JUANGONZALEZ: In Venezuela, thousands of people have taken to the streets in four days of protest and counterprotest over the closing of TV network Radio Caracas Television, or RCTV. The Venezuelan government decided not to renew RCTV’s television license earlier this year. Police, protesters and government supporters have clashed violently in Caracas since Sunday, and scores of people have been arrested.

President Hugo Chavez’s decision to close RCTV, Venezuela’s oldest private television network, has received international condemnation, including from the European Union, press freedom groups, Chile and the United States.

The Venezuelan government says it canceled RCTV over its support for the coup that briefly overthrew President Chavez five years ago. At the time, RCTV and other opposition TV channels openly supported the coup. In a national address on Monday, Chavez defended his decision to close RCTV, denouncing it as "a permanent attack on public morals." He also called news network Globovision an enemy of the state and criticized its coverage of the protest against RCTV’s closure.

PRESIDENTHUGOCHAVEZ: [translated] What Globovision did last night was an open and clear indication that they would kill me. Well, people of Globovision, I’m going to alert you in front of the country on the national chain of radio and television: I recommend that you take a tranquilizer, because, if not, I am going to do what is necessary.

JUANGONZALEZ: On Monday, Venezuela’s government announced it was suing Globovision for allegedly broadcasting material to incite a possible assassination of Chavez. It also accused U.S. news network CNN of linking him to al-Qaeda. Globovision and CNN have both denied the claims.

AMYGOODMAN: RCTV’s general manager, Marcel Granier, has described the closure as "abusive" and "arbitrary." The Venezuelan government refused to renew its license on the grounds it conspired against Chavez during the 2002 coup, including broadcasting footage falsely blaming Chavez supporters for violence, applauding coup leaders as they overthrew the government, and then refusing to report that Chavez had returned to power following mass protest.

In a moment, we’ll have a debate on this issue. But first, let’s turn to an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the 2002 coup. The film is called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.

NARRATOR: One in four Venezuelans carry handguns, and soon some of the Chavez supporters began to shoot back in the direction the sniper fire seemed to be coming from.

ANDRESIZARRA: [translated] One of the channels had a camera opposite the palace. They captured images of people shooting from the bridge. It looks like they’re shooting at the opposition march below, but you can see they, themselves, are ducking. They are clearly being shot at, but the shots of them ducking were never shown. The Chavez supporters were blamed. The images were manipulated and shown over and over again to say that Chavez supporters had assassinated innocent marchers.

PRIVATE TV CHANNELCOVERAGE: [translated] Look at that Chavez supporter. Look at him empty his gun. That Chavez supporter has just fired on unarmed peaceful protesters below, peaceful protesters who are totally unarmed.

NARRATOR: What the TV stations didn’t broadcast was this camera angle, which clearly shows that the streets below were empty. The opposition march had never taken that route. With this manipulation, the deaths could now be blamed on Chavez.

AMYGOODMAN: An excerpt of the documentary, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, by filmmakers Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain. That clip featured an interview with Andres Izarra, a news manager with RCTV during the 2002 coup. He later quit the station in protest over its coverage. After break, he will join us in debate with a Wesleyan professor over the closing of RCTV, the Wesleyan professor Francisco Rodriguez, professor of Latin American studies in Connecticut. Stay with us.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: Joining us from Caracas, Venezuela, is Andres Izarra, who quit RCTV, later served as Venezuela’s communications minister under President Chavez and is now president of TeleSUR, the multinational satellite network launched by Venezuela, Argentina, Bolivia and Cuba. And on the phone with us from Connecticut, Francisco Rodriguez, an assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University, former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. We welcome you both to Democracy Now!

Let’s begin with Andres Izarra in Venezuela. Why did President Chavez shut down RCTV?

ANDRESIZARRA: President Chavez hasn’t shut down any TV station. The concession has expired after 53 years, and the government decided not to renew the concession, because it needed to develop a national public service television. There is no shutdown at all.

JUANGONZALEZ: And could you talk a little bit about the time that you were news director at RCTV at the time of the coup and the reason for your initial resignation and your concerns about RCTV’s news coverage?

ANDRESIZARRA:RCTV, during the 2002 coup d’etat in Venezuela, was a factor aligned with the interests of the dictatorship that was installed in our country for 48 hours. It is no secret, not just with RCTV, but all the other private media, radio and television, were aligned in promoting the protests and the whole process that led to the incarceration of President Chavez during this brief period of time. And the censorship that was imposed on all of us journalists during those days in the effort of the private TV and radio stations to legitimize the dictatorship in Venezuela, it was a censorship that was imposed on us in an effort to try to legitimize this dictatorship. We could not broadcast any of the people’s reaction to the decree and to the dictator Carmona. And we could not cover anything that was happening in Venezuela, because instead of spreading the news of what was going on, the broadcast stations were broadcasting telenovelas, soap operas and cartoons.

AMYGOODMAN: We want to bring in Francisco Rodriguez, assistant professor at Wesleyan University, former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. Your response to RCTV’s closing?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: Yes, well, I think that I am actually quite surprised that Mr. Izarra says that RCTV is not being closed down. It’s the nation’s oldest private TV station. It’s been operating since the '50s. It's the nation’s most widely viewed TV station. And it’s very clear that the government is going against it because it doesn’t follow the government line, it has a very much of a pro-opposition stance.

Now, the government, as Mr. Izarra said, has charged it with supporting the coup. Now, in a democracy, usually it is not sufficient for somebody to be accused of committing a crime in order for the government to be able to take action against them. In a democracy, when somebody is believed to have conspired against the government, they have the right to defend themselves in court. They’re taken to a court of law. And only after a court has said they are guilty is it that the executive power can actually take some measure against them. So, effectively, if Mr. Izarra or Mr. Chavez have proof that RCTV conspired against the government in the coup, well, why haven’t they taken it to court? No Venezuelan court has decided that RCTV has violated any law.

And it’s actually very striking that Mr. Izarra just said that all other private media also were not transmitting the story in a view — during the April 2002 coup, were not transmitting the views of the Chavez supporters. Now, that’s very interesting, and I think that that, by and large, is true. Now, what’s interesting is that some of those media, which Mr. Izarra has just said, were doing the same thing as RCTV, have just had their concessions renewed. So, for example, Venevision has just had its concession renewed. Why, if there’s no difference between what Venevision did and what RCTV did, is RCTV’s concession revoked and Venevision’s concession renewed? Well, the reason is that Venevision now has an editorial line which is very favorable to the government. Venezuelans joke at Venevision, calling it "Venezolana de Venevision," which is a play on words that makes its name almost indistinguishable from that of the government TV station.

So, effectively, what the government is doing is that it’s using licenses and it’s using a set of other economic means, such as foreign exchange allegations, blacklisting of government opponents — the government has published a list of 3.5 million people who signed the recall referendum against them, against the government, to intimidate them — and it’s using all of these means to try to quash out dissent in Venezuela. I think that’s what’s happening. And basically, I think we’re looking at the breakdown of democracy in Venezuela.

JUANGONZALEZ: Professor Rodriquez, when you mention about how democracy functions, my understanding is that in Venezuela there really is no — and this predates the Chavez government — that there is really no process by which a television company can appeal the revocation of their license, that basically it is an executive decision of the government whether you have the privilege of holding a license, very similar to — at least here in the United States, there’s an FCC that fines stations quite often and can take away a license for failure to serve in the public interest, although clearly there’s a court procedure here in the United States, but that the Venezuelan legal system does not provide that kind of appeal process for television stations. Is that accurate?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: Sure, but there are a set of international agreements also, which have been signed by the Venezuelan government, which specify that these mechanisms, such as the renewal of licenses, such as the use of taxation or the allocation of foreign exchange, cannot be used in a way in which they are geared towards trying to change the opinion or the messages that are being transmitted by these TV stations. So they can’t be used to interfere with the freedom of speech.

So what is effectively and obviously happening here in Venezuela and is transparent in the declarations of Mr. Izarra and all of the government supporters is that RCTV is being punished for its editorial line. And there, we get into an issue where there’s a violation of the freedom of speech and where effectively the government is using its force not to regulate the broadcasting system, but actually to make it have an opinion and voice opinions which are favorable to it. And that, I think, is where we see the breakdown of democracy occurring.

JUANGONZALEZ: Mr. Izarra, your response to the position of the professor that you’re, in essence, punishing one network, whereas other networks also supposedly participated or supported the coup attempt?

ANDRESIZARRA: Well, I cannot speak on behalf of Venevision and where their editorial line is. I can only speak about TeleSUR. And we have been covering all sides of the events during all these days. Even the head of now the opposition, which is Globovision, the head of Globovision was on our air just yesterday exposing what their views were. I don’t know what Venevision is doing. I cannot speak on their behalf. But I can really say that this is a matter of sovereignty, and this is just an administrative procedure. In the past, we’ve seen in France, for example, the French government revoked the license for Berlusconi, when he was operating Tele 5, and gave it to another operator. Well, the same thing is happening here, just that in this case we’re not renewing a license.

There is no political — how do you say that? — punishment being imposed on RCTV because of their editorial line. In fact, 78 percent of the concessions in VHF in Venezuela are in private hands, most of them aligned with the opposition. Eighty-two percent of the concessions in the UHF spectrum are also in private hands, also most of them aligned with the opposition. So what we have here, again, is just an administrative procedure that is being used with political purpose to advance another coup d’etat. There’s another coup d’etat effort on the way in Venezuela, just like we had in the past.

I must remind you, the 64 days of oil sabotage that happened in our country, where the oil elite stopped oil production in Venezuela, supported by this private media. I must remind you that RCTV broadcast during 64 days thousands and thousands of TV spots, not commercials, only political messages, to take out of the government a legitimate and democratically elected government. If you have such an irresponsible operator doing what RCTV has been doing in our country for over five years, that license would be revoked immediately. If you have a private media being involved in the coup d’etat, like you had it happening in Venezuela, you would see, for sure, that channel taken off the air in the United States and its owners being put in jail.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re talking to Andres Izarra. He’s in Caracas, Venezuela, our first live national broadcast, video and audio, directly from Caracas. I apologize a bit for the sound. It sounds like there’s a bit of a rainstorm there, but it doesn’t look like that, though it looks maybe a little overcast. He is the president of TeleSUR. We’re also joined by Professor Rodriguez from Wesleyan University.

Andres Izarra, just looking at thestar.com, the latest piece out of Reuters, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez calling opposition news channel Globovision an enemy of the state, saying he would do what’s needed to stop it from inciting violence only days after he shut another opposition broadcaster. It quotes Hugo Chavez saying that. Going on to say, "Tens of thousands of Venezuelans marched in Caracas in a fourth consecutive day of protests over Chavez’s closure of [the] RCTV [network]." State TV "showed hundreds of government supporters marching in downtown Caracas celebrating Chavez’s decision. 'Enemies of the homeland, particularly those behind the scenes, I will give you a name: Globovision. Greetings, gentlemen of Globovision, you should watch where you are going,' Chavez said in a broadcast all channels had to show." He said, "'I recommend you take a tranquillizer and get into gear, because if not, I am going to do what is necessary.' He accused Globovision of trying to incite his assassination and of misreporting protests over the closure of RCTV that could whip up a situation similar to the coup attempt [against him] in 2002." Andres Izarra, your response to that Reuters report?

ANDRESIZARRA: Well, we have seen Globovision inciting the death of the president. I would like to see what would happen if NBC or CBS would broadcast what Globovision shows here, not just openly calling the people to rebel. In this very small opposition protest led by different, especially middle-class and upper-class students from private universities in Caracas and in the east of Caracas, which is the wealthiest part of the city, I would like to see how the FCC response would be for a broadcaster like Globovision that is constantly promoting rebellion and destabilization and has been supporting all anti-democratic processes and pronouncements here in Venezuela. The latest thing we’ve had is a clear, open call for the assassination of the president during one of their most vitriolic anti-Chavez shows called Alo Ciudadano.

JUANGONZALEZ: Professor Rodriguez, I’d like to ask you, looking at it from our perspective here in this country, if some networks here in this country, NBC or ABC, fomented the kind of public opposition that RCTV or Globovision have against the current administration, do you think that the government would be justified in acting against them?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: Well, I think it’s very important to talk about exactly what it is that they’re doing. And as I — first of all, as I started out saying at the beginning, I think that there has to be a judicial review, there has to be presentation of the proof against these networks that shows that they have indeed fomented opposition.

Now, let’s talk about, Mr. Izarra just mentioned, openly calling for the overthrow of the government, Globovision, during the Alo Ciudadano program. Let’s see what they did. Globovision transmitted a set of images from the history of Venezuela and the world, basically which were — it was indeed a review, after more than 50 years of transmitting, what RCTV — all of the events that they had been present in. And one of the images — and this was in a set of different historical images that they presented — was an image of the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II. And according to Minister of Communications William Lara, a group of expert semioticians — I’m not joking; this was as it was reported in The New York Times — a group of expert semioticians working in the Ministry of Communications actually have identified that the transmission of the historical video of the assassination attempt of Pope John Paul II was indeed a call to carry out an assassination attempt against Mr. Chavez. Now, anybody who believes that in a profoundly Catholic country, such as Venezuela, you are going to actually incite people to go out and kill Mr. Chavez by presenting an image of an assassination attempt against the pope is certainly clearly out of their mind.

So this is the type of evidence that the government presents against Globovision, against Radio Caracas, and at the same time, you know, you have a set of other cases, where in the government TV stations you also routinely have — and the government-owned TV stations, are completely used to propagate pro-government messages, messages — you turn on the government TV station and you see pro-Chavez slogans being chanted all of the time, not effectively respecting the difference between the fact that this TV station is property of the state and not of the government. But definitely the government feels that it has the right to do that. So, essentially, I think that — you know, in answer to your question, I think that if a TV station were to actually call for the overthrow of the government and you can prove that in court, you would have a very strong case. It turns out that when the government has actually tried to prove these things in court, even the largely favorable supreme court, actually, ended up throwing out the government’s case against military command [inaudible] for open rebellion. So the government has really had a hard time. And when one sees the type of proof that they’re presenting, one is not surprised.

AMYGOODMAN: Andres Izarra, your final response?

ANDRESIZARRA: Oh, yeah. He’s absolutely right. It is hard to — in this country, oddest things had happened here. What was a clear coup d’etat — everyone recognizes internationally, domestically, everyone knew what happened in 2002 — our courts decided that it was not a coup. It was a power vacuum that was portrayed by military men who had good intentions and were protecting the president, never a coup d’etat happened in Venezuela. So Mr. Rodriguez is right. We have a very tough problem, very strong problem here with the courts, who have not even recognized that there had been a coup d’etat here in Venezuela.

But in terms of — Mr. Rodriguez is an economist, so these economists have a very linear way of thinking, you know. If you show the images of Pope John Paul II when he was — his assassination attempt — and you put a music saying, "Everything has its end. People, go look for the end," and in a context where you are reporting on all this vitriolic chants against the government and calls for to rebel against the government and denounce a dictatorship, that simple historic image gets a new context, and the message gets a very clear direction. You people, who are broadcasting, who are communications people, know very well how images can be manipulated and can be used to promote a sense and to promote a line of thought and feelings among the people.

AMYGOODMAN: Andres Izarra, we will have to leave it there. Andres Izarra speaking to us live from Caracas, Venezuela, manager at RCTV during the 2002 coup — he quit at the time — now president of TeleSUR, the multinational satellite network launched by Venezuela, Argentina, Bolivia and Cuba. Francisco Rodriguez, joining us from Wesleyan, assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at the Connecticut school, he is former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly.

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Thu, 31 May 2007 00:00:00 -0400Five Years Later, Venezuelan Ambassador Reflects on US-Backed Coup, and Discusses Venezuela's Oil Plans, Posada Carriles, and Chavez's Controversial Decree Powershttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/4/11/five_years_later_venezuelan_ambassador_reflects
tag:democracynow.org,2007-04-11:en/story/cf4505 AMY GOODMAN : Five years ago this week, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was temporarily ousted in a short-lived coup. The date was April 11 and 12, 2002.
The leader of the coup was a business executive named Pedro Carmona. Carmona quickly received the support of the Bush administration, as well as much of the corporate press in the United States. After the coup, The New York Times proclaimed in an editorial, &quot;Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator.&quot;
But within 48 hours, following massive street protests, Chavez was back in power. After the coup, Carmona was arrested, but he managed to flee to Colombia where he sought political asylum. However, Carmona&#8217;s fate could soon change.
On Tuesday, Venezuela&#8217;s highest court ruled state prosecutors could request Carmona&#8217;s extradition from Colombia on charges of civil rebellion.
In a moment, we&#8217;ll be joined by Venezuela&#8217;s ambassador to the United States, but first let&#8217;s turn to an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the 2002 coup. The film is called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised . The excerpt begins with the White House press secretary, Ari Fleischer.
ARI FLEISCHER : Let me share with you the administration&#8217;s thoughts about what&#8217;s taking place in Venezuela. … We know that the action encouraged by the Chavez government provoked this crisis. … The Chavez government suppressed peaceful demonstrations, … fired on unarmed, peaceful protesters, resulting in 10 killed and 100 wounded. … That is what took place, … and a transitional civilian government has been installed.
NARRATOR : Despite the blackout by the Venezuelan private media, members of Chavez&#8217;s government had managed to communicate with international television networks, getting the message back to Venezuela via cable TV that Chavez had not resigned and was being held captive. Very quickly, the word began to spread.
Chavez had not been seen or heard of since he had been taken away two days earlier. That morning, as we drove around Caracas, the atmosphere was electric. Despite police repression, people had decided to march on the palace.
With so many people out on the streets, the palace guard who had remained loyal to Chavez decided to act. Behind Carmona&#8217;s back, a plot was being hatched by Chavez&#8217;s men to retake the palace. The plan was for the guard to take up key positions, surround the palace and to wait for a given signal.
With all their positions secured, the signal was given. The presidential guard moved in. Several members of the newly installed government were taken prisoner, but in the confusion, Carmona and the generals had managed to slip away.
As the guards secured the building, Chavez&#8217;s ministers, who had been in hiding for the last two days, began to arrive back to the palace to try and reestablish the legitimate cabinet.
AMY GOODMAN : A clip from the documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised , produced by Kim Bartley and Donnacha O&#8217;Brien. Venezuela&#8217;s ambassador to the United States will join us in a moment. He was in Caracas during the coup.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : We turn now back to Venezuela. Bernardo Alvarez Herrera is with us, the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States. He was in Venezuela during the coup. At the time, he was the vice minister of oil and gas under Chavez. Ambassador Alvarez, welcome to Democracy Now!
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : A very good morning to you, Amy.
AMY GOODMAN : It&#8217;s good to have you with us. Where were you when the attempted coup took place five years ago?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Well, we were basically observing the demonstration, the opposition demonstration. And, well, you know, just I remember that we were instructed to go to the TV. Basically, we went to the state television just to give messages to people, because we knew from that very moment that there was a plan to create a media coup. And, one by one, members of government went to the state television just to try to balance the information.
And then we had, you know, all the &mdash; when all the media, they started saying that the government has been shooting at the peaceful demonstration, which, as you know, was not right, and then the whole thing started, and then we have generals and then President Chavez was caught.
And I was not at the palace that day. I went back later on the 13th. But basically, until very late in the evening, President Chavez was considering the situation. There were two possibilities. One possibility was to resist and to have a military confrontation in Venezuela. President Chavez thought that that was going to be a bloodshed and it was not possible. There was also the possibility to take the government to another place in the country &mdash; Maracay, for example. And then, well, finally he was caught prisoner.
AMY GOODMAN : And how did he get back to the palace?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Well, the thing is that we were all surprised, and you have to understand that &mdash; imagine you have all the private TV, because after that, at 11:00 to 12:00, the state TV network, Channel 8, was closed down, so there was not alternative and all we had is a private media. They were celebrating. They were preparing themselves to the transition, and they were creating the situation that everything was normal, that everybody was supporting the new government, that nobody was supporting Chavez, that Chavez has resigned, etc.
And then &mdash; but, you know, that night &#8217;til 12:00 at night, there were huge demonstration and huge unrest all over the country. We were impressed, because there was not a way of knowing about that, except that through telephones and people that send you messages, because there was not media coverage through all that process.
And then, next day, the 13th, we ourselves &mdash; I was in charge of trying to protect some of my colleagues. They were more, you know &mdash; because there was a lot of political persecution &mdash; some people were killed &mdash; I went to a few embassies trying to protect some people, and we were also trying to get some of our colleagues and comrades out of the country, because we needed a voice outside the country.
But then the whole thing turned out, and at 2:00, myself, while I was resting in an unknown place, because we hardly slept those days, and I was called at 2:00 the 13th, telling, &quot;Bernardo, instead of going where you were supposed to go, come to the palace, because we are taking the palace back.&quot; And then we went there &mdash; me, personally. It was impossible to get in. I was taken by people, because there were hundreds of thousands of people, and we were taken into the palace. We were like 20, 25, 30 of us. And then, from that moment on, the whole situation was how to transmit and how to tell the Venezuelan people that we were back in palace. And we could do that only probably 10 hours later, because, as you know, there was a media blackout, a completely media blackout that day.
AMY GOODMAN : President Chavez has accused the United States of being behind the coup. Do you share that view, Ambassador Alvarez?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Yes, absolutely. And let me tell you, Amy, what happened in Venezuela, don&#8217;t forget that the undersecretary of state for Western Hemisphere was Otto Reich. Otto Reich, you just have to see what he&#8217;s doing now, what his position is in Venezuela. He&#8217;s a Cuban American, very right-wing, a person responsible for many things in the Iran-Contra, and he was the one conducting the policy.
And what happened in Venezuela is a classical coup that we had in the United States in Haiti, even in the case of Chile, when you have &mdash; if you remember the case of Chile, the whole thing started when the owners of the media, they came to Washington, they talked to Kissinger, and they said, &quot;Well, this is not sustainable. We have to do something,&quot; and they started the whole destabilization process in Chile. Exactly the same format, they used in Venezuela.
The only thing is it&#8217;s incredible that a country with huge resources dedicated to intelligence, that they just took the version of the media, and actually we don&#8217;t know now what version was that. Was it the version of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Department of State taken by the media, or was the media just taken like that by the State Department? But all you have to see is to see the format not only of that day, the 11th of April, but the previous, on all the events in that policy of regime change. So I have no doubt that they were trying to apply a much more sophisticated plan of regime change as they have done in the past.
AMY GOODMAN : Do you see those same efforts being made today?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Well, the thing is, you know, today is a very strange day for us, because it&#8217;s a bittersweet situation. On the one hand, although today we are celebrating the anniversary of the coup &mdash; and, of course, when we think about the 11th, we think always about the 13th, that for the first time in history you have these massive demonstrations of people and we were able to get back democracy in Venezuela.
But today, just today, Amy, we have, because of the inaction of the U.S. government, a known terrorist, Luis Posada Carriles, may be liberated. Today, if there is not a decision by the U.S. government to accept the request of Venezuela for preventing detention for extradition or to charge Posada Carriles with an immigration detainer, this guy might be tomorrow sleeping in his house in Miami, which is &mdash;- I don&#8217;t know. It&#8217;s like this is an emblematic figure of the double standard in the fight against terrorism, but also the icon of the Cold War, the icon of all these illegal interventions of the U.S. all over the world and particularly Latin America. So it&#8217;s amazing that we are on the one hand celebrating the 11th of April, and on the other hand Posada Carriles might be freed today. So, in the case of the coup -&mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Let me just explain for one minute, Ambassador, again, the Cuban militant, Luis Posada Carriles, a U.S. ruling allowing him to post bail. Posada is connected to the 1976 bombing of the Cuban airliner that killed 73 people, though he&#8217;s not being held in the Texas jail on terrorism charges, but on minor immigration charges. The question is: Will he be released? Now, you &mdash; the Venezuelan government has asked for him to be extradited to be tried in Venezuela. He had been jailed there, but broke out of jail. Cuba has asked for him to be extradited. What is your response to the U.S. government refusing to do this?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Yeah, look, in the case of &mdash; Cuba has said, OK, don&#8217;t send him to Cuba, and the only extradition request is the one made by Venezuela, because we have a treaty with the U.S., a 1922 treaty, extradition treaty with the U.S., that we have even used in the past. So the U.S. government, if they want to be consistent with their policies against terrorism, they only have two options: One, they extradite him to Venezuela, and we will judge him in Venezuela for terrorism; or second, they have to try and judge him in the U.S. for terrorism, because the U.S. have to follow the international law, the Montreal Agreement and many other legal instruments that actually the U.S. have to follow.
So the problem is, we have requested the extradition of Posada, even before he became public in Miami, because we knew &mdash; everybody knew &mdash; that he was in Miami. And yesterday, we sent another diplomatic note to the State Department saying, &quot;After 22 months waiting, you haven&#8217;t done anything. So now that this guy might be free, so we, Venezuela, we want to again request that you detain &mdash; that is, a preventive detention of Posada on the extradition request &mdash; and we reaffirm the request for extradition of Posada.&quot;
AMY GOODMAN : On September 28, 2005, a U.S. judge ruled Posada cannot be deported to Venezuela, because he &quot;faces the threat of torture&quot; in Venezuela. Ambassador Alvarez, your response?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Yeah, well, my response is in that &mdash; you know, that the one that represent Venezuela in that case is the U.S. government. I cannot send to El Paso my own lawyer, because, as we have a treaty of extradition, the U.S. government is representing Venezuela. And you know what happened? That in that hearing the only witness presented was an associate of Posada that used to be also with him working in the police in Venezuela. He was his lawyer, and he, himself, he said that he thinks that there was not conditions for him in Venezuela. And the U.S. government did not present, did not even question this witness. So from the very beginning, that was the inaction of the U.S. government, because they could have told us, they could have brought many people from Venezuela that would tell that Posada will have, we guarantee, all the rights for him, but he has to be judged in trial. I mean, we cannot keep him only because of immigration. It&#8217;s like if you were going to take Osama bin Laden to a country because he&#8217;s entering a country without a visa.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re talking to the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States, Bernardo Alvarez Herrera. He&#8217;s joining us in the Washington studio. Ambassador, there was an interesting article in The New York Times yesterday, &quot;High Stakes: Chavez Plays the Oil Card.&quot; And it says, &quot;With President Hugo Chavez setting a May 1 deadline for an ambitious plan to wrest control of several major oil projects from American and European companies, a showdown is looming here over access to some of the most coveted energy resources outside the Middle East.&quot;
It quotes a number of oil analysts, like Pietro Pitts, an oil analyst who publishes Latin Petroleum , an industry magazine based in Venezuela, who says, &quot;Chavez is playing a game of chicken with the largest oil companies in the world. And for the moment, he&#8217;s winning,&quot; he says. And it says the confrontation could easily end up, though, with everyone losing.
Can you explain what the May 1 deadline is and what President Chavez&#8217;s plans are for oil in Venezuela?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Well, first, there is no surprises in that, in the actions we have been taking. And that was part of the coup d&#8217;état, because, as you remember, we changed the law, and we went through a process, and we had a new hydrocarbon law. And in this new hydrocarbon law, we reverted the privatization process in Venezuela regarding oil and gas, particularly of upstream oil. So companies knew from the very beginning that under the new law we were changing the conditions, first.
But second, we were giving them the chance to participate with us. Private companies, U.S. private companies cannot participate in Mexican oil. Imagine that. And Mexican is a political ally of the U.S., and you have signed a treaty, a free trade agreement, with Mexico. But U.S. companies could not participate in Mexico, in Saudi Arabia and in many other countries.
So, on the one hand, in that law we reaffirm which has been a historical principle of Venezuela that the government should and the state should control the natural resources and we have to have the majority. But also, we gave chances to private capital, national and international, to participate, and this is what we have been doing. First, we changed the service contract, and now we are taking the majority in the heavy oil projects in the Faja. We have been talking to the companies. We have been &mdash; me, personally &mdash; have been talking to all of them. They have to decide whether they should stay or not. We hope that most of them will stay, if not all, because we are giving them the chance to access the Venezuelan reserves. So this May 1 is the last &mdash; let&#8217;s say the last phase of a policy of recovering the control of natural resources in Venezuela that we started in the year 2000.
AMY GOODMAN : Looking at ExxonMobil, the New York Times piece goes on to, well, first quote Michael Economides, an oil consultant in Houston, who said, &quot;We are on a collision course with Chavez over oil.&quot; He compared Chavez&#8217;s populist appeal in Latin America with the pan-Arabism of Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi of Libya two decades ago, saying, &quot;Chavez poses a much bigger threat to America&#8217;s energy security than Saddam Hussein ever did.&quot;
And then, the article says, &quot;Consider the quandary facing Exxon Mobil after its chairman, Rex W. Tillerson, recently suggested that Exxon might be forced to abandon a major Venezuelan oil project because of its growing troubles with Mr. Chavez. The energy world took notice. So did Mr. Chavez&#8217;s government. Only a day later, Venezuelan agents raided Exxon&#8217;s offices here in the San Ignacio towers, a bastion for this country&#8217;s business elite. The government said that the raid was part of a tax investigation, but energy analysts said the exchange of threat and counterthreat was all too clear.&quot;
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : He&#8217;s very &mdash; it&#8217;s funny that the person that wrote this article, that we know, he didn&#8217;t talk to me, for example, because he has taken the second sources, and analysts &mdash; you know, in today&#8217;s world &quot;analyst&quot; could mean anything.
AMY GOODMAN : Simon Romero and Clifford Krauss were the authors of the piece.
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Yes. And I know. We have talked to him. And apparently it&#8217;s because they want to create &mdash; I don&#8217;t know what they want to create in May 1.
Let me tell you, this is not the perception we have with companies. We are working with them. We are negotiating with them. We did a very successful negotiation process with 32 companies, in which we changed the old service contract, a new &mdash; mixed companies with majority of the government. Most of the companies &mdash; all, except one &mdash;- did participate, and we are now in a process of arbitr&mdash;- negotiation process with the only one company that did not want to participate.
We have been compensating companies for fair compensation when we have a goal for a process of increasing the state participation. It&#8217;s no doubt that we are going to talk to all companies, and if they have to lose part of the participation, they will be compensated. We have the U.S. companies. They might have, some of them, less participation, but we have companies from all over the world participating with us. We have democratized the participation in the Venezuelan reserves. So this is a completely different picture. They want to create a problem, when there is not a problem. There is an adjustment to a policy that has been clearly expressed by Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN : Ambassador Alvarez, we don&#8217;t have much time, and I wanted to switch to another issue. I wanted to play for you an excerpt of a conversation that I had earlier this year. The Venezuelan National Assembly agreed to President Chavez&#8217;s request that he be allowed to rule by decree in some areas for the next 18 months. The decision has been criticized as undemocratic by some of Chavez&#8217;s opponents. I recently interviewed one critic named Francisco Rodriguez. He teaches at Wesleyan University and is a former chief economist of the Venezuela National Assembly. This is what he had to say, and then I&#8217;d like your response.
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : This figure of enabling law, the law that enables the president to rule by decree, has been used previously in Venezuela, but in the past it used to be very well circumscribed to specific areas of legislation, such as during the debt crisis. The president was granted authority to legislate on particular economic issues. But now what we&#8217;re seeing is an enabling law that will allow President Chavez to rule by decree in just about every area of the Venezuelan economy and society. It&#8217;s couched in very vague terms, such as social and economic rights transforming state institutions. For the first time in history, the president will have the right to rewrite organic laws, which are laws of constitutional rank, which generally would take a two-thirds majority in the Assembly to change them, but now he will be allowed to do that by decree. So we are seeing a lot of power put in the hands of the president, and we&#8217;re seeing something very close to the end of any type of separation of power in Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN : Ambassador Alvarez, your response?
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Well, look, as he said, we have been using that in the past. Secondly, we have granted &mdash; the National Assembly has granted that special powers to president for 12 &mdash; 18 months. In our constitutional tradition, you give that and you have to have a frame, a time frame, for that. And we have to go to certain areas &mdash; social, economics &mdash; and, as he said, we are now including a lot of areas.
But one thing which is important is we cannot, in all &mdash; according to our constitution, rights, principle, have to be guaranteed. So we cannot discuss, for example, private property. We cannot legislate on one of the principle of the constitution. This is one thing.
And one thing that he is missing, which is the key of all that, is, in the new constitution, there is a possibilities of popular referendum, meaning that if the National Assembly pass a law, and sectors of society, they don&#8217;t like that law, although it&#8217;s legal, they can go and only with 5 percent of signatures of registered voters they can go and ask for a national popular referendum. And if they win that national popular referendum, that specific law that was passed during this period should be cancelled.
AMY GOODMAN : Ambassador Alvarez, we&#8217;re going to have to leave it there. I thank you very much for being with us.
BERNARDO ALVAREZ HERRERA : Thank you, Amy.
AMY GOODMAN : Bernardo Alvarez Herrera is the ambassador from Venezuela to the United States. AMYGOODMAN: Five years ago this week, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was temporarily ousted in a short-lived coup. The date was April 11 and 12, 2002.

The leader of the coup was a business executive named Pedro Carmona. Carmona quickly received the support of the Bush administration, as well as much of the corporate press in the United States. After the coup, The New York Times proclaimed in an editorial, "Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator."

But within 48 hours, following massive street protests, Chavez was back in power. After the coup, Carmona was arrested, but he managed to flee to Colombia where he sought political asylum. However, Carmona’s fate could soon change.

On Tuesday, Venezuela’s highest court ruled state prosecutors could request Carmona’s extradition from Colombia on charges of civil rebellion.

In a moment, we’ll be joined by Venezuela’s ambassador to the United States, but first let’s turn to an excerpt of a documentary made by two filmmakers who were in Caracas during the 2002 coup. The film is called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. The excerpt begins with the White House press secretary, Ari Fleischer.

ARIFLEISCHER: Let me share with you the administration’s thoughts about what’s taking place in Venezuela. … We know that the action encouraged by the Chavez government provoked this crisis. … The Chavez government suppressed peaceful demonstrations, … fired on unarmed, peaceful protesters, resulting in 10 killed and 100 wounded. … That is what took place, … and a transitional civilian government has been installed.

NARRATOR: Despite the blackout by the Venezuelan private media, members of Chavez’s government had managed to communicate with international television networks, getting the message back to Venezuela via cable TV that Chavez had not resigned and was being held captive. Very quickly, the word began to spread.

Chavez had not been seen or heard of since he had been taken away two days earlier. That morning, as we drove around Caracas, the atmosphere was electric. Despite police repression, people had decided to march on the palace.

With so many people out on the streets, the palace guard who had remained loyal to Chavez decided to act. Behind Carmona’s back, a plot was being hatched by Chavez’s men to retake the palace. The plan was for the guard to take up key positions, surround the palace and to wait for a given signal.

With all their positions secured, the signal was given. The presidential guard moved in. Several members of the newly installed government were taken prisoner, but in the confusion, Carmona and the generals had managed to slip away.

As the guards secured the building, Chavez’s ministers, who had been in hiding for the last two days, began to arrive back to the palace to try and reestablish the legitimate cabinet.

AMYGOODMAN: A clip from the documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, produced by Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Brien. Venezuela’s ambassador to the United States will join us in a moment. He was in Caracas during the coup.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: We turn now back to Venezuela. Bernardo Alvarez Herrera is with us, the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States. He was in Venezuela during the coup. At the time, he was the vice minister of oil and gas under Chavez. Ambassador Alvarez, welcome to Democracy Now!

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: A very good morning to you, Amy.

AMYGOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Where were you when the attempted coup took place five years ago?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Well, we were basically observing the demonstration, the opposition demonstration. And, well, you know, just I remember that we were instructed to go to the TV. Basically, we went to the state television just to give messages to people, because we knew from that very moment that there was a plan to create a media coup. And, one by one, members of government went to the state television just to try to balance the information.

And then we had, you know, all the — when all the media, they started saying that the government has been shooting at the peaceful demonstration, which, as you know, was not right, and then the whole thing started, and then we have generals and then President Chavez was caught.

And I was not at the palace that day. I went back later on the 13th. But basically, until very late in the evening, President Chavez was considering the situation. There were two possibilities. One possibility was to resist and to have a military confrontation in Venezuela. President Chavez thought that that was going to be a bloodshed and it was not possible. There was also the possibility to take the government to another place in the country — Maracay, for example. And then, well, finally he was caught prisoner.

AMYGOODMAN: And how did he get back to the palace?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Well, the thing is that we were all surprised, and you have to understand that — imagine you have all the private TV, because after that, at 11:00 to 12:00, the state TV network, Channel 8, was closed down, so there was not alternative and all we had is a private media. They were celebrating. They were preparing themselves to the transition, and they were creating the situation that everything was normal, that everybody was supporting the new government, that nobody was supporting Chavez, that Chavez has resigned, etc.

And then — but, you know, that night ’til 12:00 at night, there were huge demonstration and huge unrest all over the country. We were impressed, because there was not a way of knowing about that, except that through telephones and people that send you messages, because there was not media coverage through all that process.

And then, next day, the 13th, we ourselves — I was in charge of trying to protect some of my colleagues. They were more, you know — because there was a lot of political persecution — some people were killed — I went to a few embassies trying to protect some people, and we were also trying to get some of our colleagues and comrades out of the country, because we needed a voice outside the country.

But then the whole thing turned out, and at 2:00, myself, while I was resting in an unknown place, because we hardly slept those days, and I was called at 2:00 the 13th, telling, "Bernardo, instead of going where you were supposed to go, come to the palace, because we are taking the palace back." And then we went there — me, personally. It was impossible to get in. I was taken by people, because there were hundreds of thousands of people, and we were taken into the palace. We were like 20, 25, 30 of us. And then, from that moment on, the whole situation was how to transmit and how to tell the Venezuelan people that we were back in palace. And we could do that only probably 10 hours later, because, as you know, there was a media blackout, a completely media blackout that day.

AMYGOODMAN: President Chavez has accused the United States of being behind the coup. Do you share that view, Ambassador Alvarez?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Yes, absolutely. And let me tell you, Amy, what happened in Venezuela, don’t forget that the undersecretary of state for Western Hemisphere was Otto Reich. Otto Reich, you just have to see what he’s doing now, what his position is in Venezuela. He’s a Cuban American, very right-wing, a person responsible for many things in the Iran-Contra, and he was the one conducting the policy.

And what happened in Venezuela is a classical coup that we had in the United States in Haiti, even in the case of Chile, when you have — if you remember the case of Chile, the whole thing started when the owners of the media, they came to Washington, they talked to Kissinger, and they said, "Well, this is not sustainable. We have to do something," and they started the whole destabilization process in Chile. Exactly the same format, they used in Venezuela.

The only thing is it’s incredible that a country with huge resources dedicated to intelligence, that they just took the version of the media, and actually we don’t know now what version was that. Was it the version of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Department of State taken by the media, or was the media just taken like that by the State Department? But all you have to see is to see the format not only of that day, the 11th of April, but the previous, on all the events in that policy of regime change. So I have no doubt that they were trying to apply a much more sophisticated plan of regime change as they have done in the past.

AMYGOODMAN: Do you see those same efforts being made today?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Well, the thing is, you know, today is a very strange day for us, because it’s a bittersweet situation. On the one hand, although today we are celebrating the anniversary of the coup — and, of course, when we think about the 11th, we think always about the 13th, that for the first time in history you have these massive demonstrations of people and we were able to get back democracy in Venezuela.

But today, just today, Amy, we have, because of the inaction of the U.S. government, a known terrorist, Luis Posada Carriles, may be liberated. Today, if there is not a decision by the U.S. government to accept the request of Venezuela for preventing detention for extradition or to charge Posada Carriles with an immigration detainer, this guy might be tomorrow sleeping in his house in Miami, which is —- I don’t know. It’s like this is an emblematic figure of the double standard in the fight against terrorism, but also the icon of the Cold War, the icon of all these illegal interventions of the U.S. all over the world and particularly Latin America. So it’s amazing that we are on the one hand celebrating the 11th of April, and on the other hand Posada Carriles might be freed today. So, in the case of the coup -—

AMYGOODMAN: Let me just explain for one minute, Ambassador, again, the Cuban militant, Luis Posada Carriles, a U.S. ruling allowing him to post bail. Posada is connected to the 1976 bombing of the Cuban airliner that killed 73 people, though he’s not being held in the Texas jail on terrorism charges, but on minor immigration charges. The question is: Will he be released? Now, you — the Venezuelan government has asked for him to be extradited to be tried in Venezuela. He had been jailed there, but broke out of jail. Cuba has asked for him to be extradited. What is your response to the U.S. government refusing to do this?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Yeah, look, in the case of — Cuba has said, OK, don’t send him to Cuba, and the only extradition request is the one made by Venezuela, because we have a treaty with the U.S., a 1922 treaty, extradition treaty with the U.S., that we have even used in the past. So the U.S. government, if they want to be consistent with their policies against terrorism, they only have two options: One, they extradite him to Venezuela, and we will judge him in Venezuela for terrorism; or second, they have to try and judge him in the U.S. for terrorism, because the U.S. have to follow the international law, the Montreal Agreement and many other legal instruments that actually the U.S. have to follow.

So the problem is, we have requested the extradition of Posada, even before he became public in Miami, because we knew — everybody knew — that he was in Miami. And yesterday, we sent another diplomatic note to the State Department saying, "After 22 months waiting, you haven’t done anything. So now that this guy might be free, so we, Venezuela, we want to again request that you detain — that is, a preventive detention of Posada on the extradition request — and we reaffirm the request for extradition of Posada."

AMYGOODMAN: On September 28, 2005, a U.S. judge ruled Posada cannot be deported to Venezuela, because he "faces the threat of torture" in Venezuela. Ambassador Alvarez, your response?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Yeah, well, my response is in that — you know, that the one that represent Venezuela in that case is the U.S. government. I cannot send to El Paso my own lawyer, because, as we have a treaty of extradition, the U.S. government is representing Venezuela. And you know what happened? That in that hearing the only witness presented was an associate of Posada that used to be also with him working in the police in Venezuela. He was his lawyer, and he, himself, he said that he thinks that there was not conditions for him in Venezuela. And the U.S. government did not present, did not even question this witness. So from the very beginning, that was the inaction of the U.S. government, because they could have told us, they could have brought many people from Venezuela that would tell that Posada will have, we guarantee, all the rights for him, but he has to be judged in trial. I mean, we cannot keep him only because of immigration. It’s like if you were going to take Osama bin Laden to a country because he’s entering a country without a visa.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re talking to the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States, Bernardo Alvarez Herrera. He’s joining us in the Washington studio. Ambassador, there was an interesting article in The New York Times yesterday, "High Stakes: Chavez Plays the Oil Card." And it says, "With President Hugo Chavez setting a May 1 deadline for an ambitious plan to wrest control of several major oil projects from American and European companies, a showdown is looming here over access to some of the most coveted energy resources outside the Middle East."

It quotes a number of oil analysts, like Pietro Pitts, an oil analyst who publishes Latin Petroleum, an industry magazine based in Venezuela, who says, "Chavez is playing a game of chicken with the largest oil companies in the world. And for the moment, he’s winning," he says. And it says the confrontation could easily end up, though, with everyone losing.

Can you explain what the May 1 deadline is and what President Chavez’s plans are for oil in Venezuela?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Well, first, there is no surprises in that, in the actions we have been taking. And that was part of the coup d’état, because, as you remember, we changed the law, and we went through a process, and we had a new hydrocarbon law. And in this new hydrocarbon law, we reverted the privatization process in Venezuela regarding oil and gas, particularly of upstream oil. So companies knew from the very beginning that under the new law we were changing the conditions, first.

But second, we were giving them the chance to participate with us. Private companies, U.S. private companies cannot participate in Mexican oil. Imagine that. And Mexican is a political ally of the U.S., and you have signed a treaty, a free trade agreement, with Mexico. But U.S. companies could not participate in Mexico, in Saudi Arabia and in many other countries.

So, on the one hand, in that law we reaffirm which has been a historical principle of Venezuela that the government should and the state should control the natural resources and we have to have the majority. But also, we gave chances to private capital, national and international, to participate, and this is what we have been doing. First, we changed the service contract, and now we are taking the majority in the heavy oil projects in the Faja. We have been talking to the companies. We have been — me, personally — have been talking to all of them. They have to decide whether they should stay or not. We hope that most of them will stay, if not all, because we are giving them the chance to access the Venezuelan reserves. So this May 1 is the last — let’s say the last phase of a policy of recovering the control of natural resources in Venezuela that we started in the year 2000.

AMYGOODMAN: Looking at ExxonMobil, the New York Times piece goes on to, well, first quote Michael Economides, an oil consultant in Houston, who said, "We are on a collision course with Chavez over oil." He compared Chavez’s populist appeal in Latin America with the pan-Arabism of Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi of Libya two decades ago, saying, "Chavez poses a much bigger threat to America’s energy security than Saddam Hussein ever did."

And then, the article says, "Consider the quandary facing Exxon Mobil after its chairman, Rex W. Tillerson, recently suggested that Exxon might be forced to abandon a major Venezuelan oil project because of its growing troubles with Mr. Chavez. The energy world took notice. So did Mr. Chavez’s government. Only a day later, Venezuelan agents raided Exxon’s offices here in the San Ignacio towers, a bastion for this country’s business elite. The government said that the raid was part of a tax investigation, but energy analysts said the exchange of threat and counterthreat was all too clear."

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: He’s very — it’s funny that the person that wrote this article, that we know, he didn’t talk to me, for example, because he has taken the second sources, and analysts — you know, in today’s world "analyst" could mean anything.

AMYGOODMAN: Simon Romero and Clifford Krauss were the authors of the piece.

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Yes. And I know. We have talked to him. And apparently it’s because they want to create — I don’t know what they want to create in May 1.

Let me tell you, this is not the perception we have with companies. We are working with them. We are negotiating with them. We did a very successful negotiation process with 32 companies, in which we changed the old service contract, a new — mixed companies with majority of the government. Most of the companies — all, except one —- did participate, and we are now in a process of arbitr—- negotiation process with the only one company that did not want to participate.

We have been compensating companies for fair compensation when we have a goal for a process of increasing the state participation. It’s no doubt that we are going to talk to all companies, and if they have to lose part of the participation, they will be compensated. We have the U.S. companies. They might have, some of them, less participation, but we have companies from all over the world participating with us. We have democratized the participation in the Venezuelan reserves. So this is a completely different picture. They want to create a problem, when there is not a problem. There is an adjustment to a policy that has been clearly expressed by Venezuela.

AMYGOODMAN: Ambassador Alvarez, we don’t have much time, and I wanted to switch to another issue. I wanted to play for you an excerpt of a conversation that I had earlier this year. The Venezuelan National Assembly agreed to President Chavez’s request that he be allowed to rule by decree in some areas for the next 18 months. The decision has been criticized as undemocratic by some of Chavez’s opponents. I recently interviewed one critic named Francisco Rodriguez. He teaches at Wesleyan University and is a former chief economist of the Venezuela National Assembly. This is what he had to say, and then I’d like your response.

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: This figure of enabling law, the law that enables the president to rule by decree, has been used previously in Venezuela, but in the past it used to be very well circumscribed to specific areas of legislation, such as during the debt crisis. The president was granted authority to legislate on particular economic issues. But now what we’re seeing is an enabling law that will allow President Chavez to rule by decree in just about every area of the Venezuelan economy and society. It’s couched in very vague terms, such as social and economic rights transforming state institutions. For the first time in history, the president will have the right to rewrite organic laws, which are laws of constitutional rank, which generally would take a two-thirds majority in the Assembly to change them, but now he will be allowed to do that by decree. So we are seeing a lot of power put in the hands of the president, and we’re seeing something very close to the end of any type of separation of power in Venezuela.

AMYGOODMAN: Ambassador Alvarez, your response?

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Well, look, as he said, we have been using that in the past. Secondly, we have granted — the National Assembly has granted that special powers to president for 12 — 18 months. In our constitutional tradition, you give that and you have to have a frame, a time frame, for that. And we have to go to certain areas — social, economics — and, as he said, we are now including a lot of areas.

But one thing which is important is we cannot, in all — according to our constitution, rights, principle, have to be guaranteed. So we cannot discuss, for example, private property. We cannot legislate on one of the principle of the constitution. This is one thing.

And one thing that he is missing, which is the key of all that, is, in the new constitution, there is a possibilities of popular referendum, meaning that if the National Assembly pass a law, and sectors of society, they don’t like that law, although it’s legal, they can go and only with 5 percent of signatures of registered voters they can go and ask for a national popular referendum. And if they win that national popular referendum, that specific law that was passed during this period should be cancelled.

AMYGOODMAN: Ambassador Alvarez, we’re going to have to leave it there. I thank you very much for being with us.

BERNARDOALVAREZHERRERA: Thank you, Amy.

AMYGOODMAN: Bernardo Alvarez Herrera is the ambassador from Venezuela to the United States.

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Wed, 11 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0400Hugo Chavez to George W. Bush: Gringo Go Homehttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/3/12/hugo_chavez_to_george_w_bush
tag:democracynow.org,2007-03-12:en/story/e79628 AMY GOODMAN : President Bush has arrived in Guatemala for the second-to-last stop of his five-nation tour of Latin America. He is meeting with Guatemalan President Oscar Berger for talks expected to be dominated by immigration and free trade.
Bush&#8217;s visit to the region has been marked by mass protest and marches. In Brazil Thursday, 30,000 people took to the streets. The next day in Uruguay, some 6,000 marched in the capital of Montevideo. In Bogota, police made 120 arrests when 5,000 protesters marched just one mile from where Bush held talks with the Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. Bush will travel to Mexico later today for the last leg of his tour.
While many analysts agree the president&#8217;s trip is part of an effort to gain back influence in the region, the White House has sought to portray the tour as part of a humanitarian effort to address issues of poverty. Last week in Washington, President Bush spoke before the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH : You know, not far from the White House, there&#8217;s a statue of the great liberator Simon Bolivar. He&#8217;s often compared to George Washington &mdash; Jorge W. Like Washington, he was a general who fought for the right of his people to govern themselves. Like Washington, he succeeded in defeating a much stronger colonial power. And like Washington, he belongs to all of us who love liberty. One Latin American diplomat had put it this way: &quot;Neither Washington nor Bolivar was destined to have children of their own, so that we Americans might call ourselves their children.&quot;
We are the sons and daughters of this struggle, and it is our mission to complete the revolution they began on our two continents. The millions across our hemisphere who every day suffer the degradations of poverty and hunger have a right to be impatient. And I&#8217;m going to make them this pledge: The goal of this great country, the goal of a country full of generous people, is an Americas where the dignity of every person is respected, where all find room at the table, and where opportunity reaches into every village and every home. By extending the blessings of liberty to the least among us, we will fulfill the destiny of this new world and set a shining example for others. Que Dios les bendiga .
AMY GOODMAN : President Bush, speaking in Washington last week. In addition to the mass protests to his presence in the region, Bush has been dogged by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who&#8217;s on a counter-tour of Latin America at the same time. In fact, Chavez has practically shadowed Bush since the beginning of his trip. When Bush was in Uruguay on Friday, Chavez held a mass rally in neighboring Argentina. When Bush flew to Colombia, Chavez addressed thousands in Bolivia. When Bush was in Guatemala, Chavez is again close by in neighboring Nicaragua.
Today, we&#8217;re going to play an excerpt of one of Chavez&#8217;s speeches, this at the mass rally in Buenos Aires on Friday. The Venezuelan president launched a stinging attack on Bush, who was in Uruguay, just 30 miles away across the River Plate.
PRESIDENT HUGO CHAVEZ : [translated] On the other side of the river, that is where that little gentleman of the North must be. Let&#8217;s give him a big boo! Gringo, go home!
I am convinced that our friends in Brasilia and in Montevideo are not going to feel offended, because we would not want to hurt any of our brethren from Uruguay or Brazil. We recognize their sovereignty. We recognize that those governments have the sovereign right to invite the little gentleman of the North, if they so choose.
But Kirchner and I don&#8217;t need to plan anything to sabotage this visit, because we are witnessing the true political cadaver. The president of the United States is a political cadaver. He doesn&#8217;t even smell of sulfur anymore. He doesn&#8217;t even smell of sulfur or brimstone, if you will. No longer. What you smell from him now is the stench of political death. And not long from now, he will turn to dust and disappear. So we don&#8217;t need to put forth any effort to sabotage the visit of the president of the United States to some countries, sisters countries of Central and South America, of course. We don&#8217;t need to do that. It&#8217;s a simple coincidence, the visit of Nestor to Venezuela and our visit here to Buenos Aires.
Well, we nevertheless need to thank that little gentleman that&#8217;s visiting us, because if he were not here in South America, perhaps this event would not be so well attended. We have organized this event to say no to the presence of the chief of the empire here in the heroic lands of South America.
The imperial little gentleman that&#8217;s visiting Latin America today said about 72 or 48 hours ago in one of his speeches, when he was announcing that he was leaving for Latin America, he compared Simon Bolivar to George Washington. In fact, he even said the ridiculous thing &mdash; and I can&#8217;t say it&#8217;s hypocrisy, because it is simply ridiculous, the most ridiculous thing he could say. He said, today we are all children of Washington and Bolivar. That is, he thinks that he is a son of Bolivar. What he is is a son of a &mdash; but I can&#8217;t say that word here.
So he has said &mdash; he has said &mdash; and you should listen to what he said here &mdash; he said that now is the time to finish the revolution that Washington and Bolivar commenced. How&#8217;s that for heresy? That is heresy and ignorance, because we have to remember &mdash; and I say this with all due respect to George Washington, who is historically one of the founding fathers of that country &mdash; but we must also remember the differences and how different George Washington and Simon Bolivar were, are and will always be.
George Washington won a war to gain the independence of the North American economic elite from the English empire, and when Washington died, or, rather, after his independence and after having been the president of the United States, after ordering the massacre of the indigenous peoples of North America, after defending slavery, he ended up being a very rich owner of slaves and of a plantation. He was a great landowner. That was George Washington.
Simon Bolivar, however, was born with a silver spoon, and at eight years old his parents died and he inherited a large fortune, together with his brothers, and he inherited haciendas and slaves. Simon Bolivar, when history led him &mdash; and as Karl Marx said, men can make history, but only as far as history allows us to do so &mdash; when history took Bolivar and made him the leader of the independence process in Venezuela, he made that process revolutionary. Simon Bolivar turned over all of his land. He freed all of his slaves, and he turned them into soldiers, and he brought them here. He brought them to Peru and Carabobo, and he worked together with the troops of San Martin to liberate this continent. That is Simon Bolivar.
And Simon Bolivar, having been born with that silver spoon in his mouth, when he died on the Caribbean coast of Colombia, when he died on December 17 in 1830, he was dressed with a shirt of someone else, because he had no clothes. Simon Bolivar is the leader of the revolution of this land. He is the leader of the social revolution, the people&#8217;s revolution, the historical revolution. George Washington has nothing &mdash; nothing &mdash; to do with this history.
It was in 1823 that James Monroe said, &quot;America for the Americans.&quot; And when I say this tonight, I say it because I want to remind you, my brothers of Argentina, of Venezuela and of America, that the presence of the president of the United States in South America represents all of that. He represents that Monroe Doctrine of America for the Americans. Well, we will have to tell him: North America for the North Americans and South America for the South Americans. This is our America.
The president of the United States, that political cadaver &mdash; and when I say political cadaver, he would like to see me as a real cadaver &mdash; I want him to be a political cadaver, and he already is a political cadaver. The president of the United States has the lowest level of credibility and acceptance from his own people. He is the current president of the United States.
It would appear that he doesn&#8217;t even dare mention my name, because he was asked in Brasilia today in a press conference &mdash; I saw it, I watched it at the hotel &mdash; and the journalist asked him, &quot;It is said that you are here to stop Chavez&#8217;s movement in South America.&quot; And it looked like he almost had a heart attack when he heard &quot;Chavez,&quot; because he actually stuttered a couple of times, and he actually changed the subject. He didn&#8217;t answer the question. He didn&#8217;t answer the question at all. So he doesn&#8217;t even dare.
And I definitely dare to say his name. The president of the United States of North America, George W. Bush, the little gentleman of the North, the political cadaver that is visiting South America, that little gentleman is the president of all the history of the United States, and in the history of the United States, he has the lowest level of approval in his own country. And if we add that to the level of approval that he has in the world, I would think he&#8217;s in the red now &mdash; negative numbers.
AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in Argentina on Friday, speaking before a mass rally of tens of thousands of people &mdash; an excerpt of that address. When we come back, response to the Latin American trip with Greg Grandin, who is author of Empire&#8217;s Workshop , a professor in Latin American studies. We&#8217;ll also speak with Steve Ellner, just back from Venezuela. Stay with us. AMYGOODMAN: President Bush has arrived in Guatemala for the second-to-last stop of his five-nation tour of Latin America. He is meeting with Guatemalan President Oscar Berger for talks expected to be dominated by immigration and free trade.

Bush’s visit to the region has been marked by mass protest and marches. In Brazil Thursday, 30,000 people took to the streets. The next day in Uruguay, some 6,000 marched in the capital of Montevideo. In Bogota, police made 120 arrests when 5,000 protesters marched just one mile from where Bush held talks with the Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. Bush will travel to Mexico later today for the last leg of his tour.

While many analysts agree the president’s trip is part of an effort to gain back influence in the region, the White House has sought to portray the tour as part of a humanitarian effort to address issues of poverty. Last week in Washington, President Bush spoke before the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

PRESIDENTGEORGE W. BUSH: You know, not far from the White House, there’s a statue of the great liberator Simon Bolivar. He’s often compared to George Washington — Jorge W. Like Washington, he was a general who fought for the right of his people to govern themselves. Like Washington, he succeeded in defeating a much stronger colonial power. And like Washington, he belongs to all of us who love liberty. One Latin American diplomat had put it this way: "Neither Washington nor Bolivar was destined to have children of their own, so that we Americans might call ourselves their children."

We are the sons and daughters of this struggle, and it is our mission to complete the revolution they began on our two continents. The millions across our hemisphere who every day suffer the degradations of poverty and hunger have a right to be impatient. And I’m going to make them this pledge: The goal of this great country, the goal of a country full of generous people, is an Americas where the dignity of every person is respected, where all find room at the table, and where opportunity reaches into every village and every home. By extending the blessings of liberty to the least among us, we will fulfill the destiny of this new world and set a shining example for others. Que Dios les bendiga.

AMYGOODMAN: President Bush, speaking in Washington last week. In addition to the mass protests to his presence in the region, Bush has been dogged by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who’s on a counter-tour of Latin America at the same time. In fact, Chavez has practically shadowed Bush since the beginning of his trip. When Bush was in Uruguay on Friday, Chavez held a mass rally in neighboring Argentina. When Bush flew to Colombia, Chavez addressed thousands in Bolivia. When Bush was in Guatemala, Chavez is again close by in neighboring Nicaragua.

Today, we’re going to play an excerpt of one of Chavez’s speeches, this at the mass rally in Buenos Aires on Friday. The Venezuelan president launched a stinging attack on Bush, who was in Uruguay, just 30 miles away across the River Plate.

PRESIDENTHUGOCHAVEZ: [translated] On the other side of the river, that is where that little gentleman of the North must be. Let’s give him a big boo! Gringo, go home!

I am convinced that our friends in Brasilia and in Montevideo are not going to feel offended, because we would not want to hurt any of our brethren from Uruguay or Brazil. We recognize their sovereignty. We recognize that those governments have the sovereign right to invite the little gentleman of the North, if they so choose.

But Kirchner and I don’t need to plan anything to sabotage this visit, because we are witnessing the true political cadaver. The president of the United States is a political cadaver. He doesn’t even smell of sulfur anymore. He doesn’t even smell of sulfur or brimstone, if you will. No longer. What you smell from him now is the stench of political death. And not long from now, he will turn to dust and disappear. So we don’t need to put forth any effort to sabotage the visit of the president of the United States to some countries, sisters countries of Central and South America, of course. We don’t need to do that. It’s a simple coincidence, the visit of Nestor to Venezuela and our visit here to Buenos Aires.

Well, we nevertheless need to thank that little gentleman that’s visiting us, because if he were not here in South America, perhaps this event would not be so well attended. We have organized this event to say no to the presence of the chief of the empire here in the heroic lands of South America.

The imperial little gentleman that’s visiting Latin America today said about 72 or 48 hours ago in one of his speeches, when he was announcing that he was leaving for Latin America, he compared Simon Bolivar to George Washington. In fact, he even said the ridiculous thing — and I can’t say it’s hypocrisy, because it is simply ridiculous, the most ridiculous thing he could say. He said, today we are all children of Washington and Bolivar. That is, he thinks that he is a son of Bolivar. What he is is a son of a — but I can’t say that word here.

So he has said — he has said — and you should listen to what he said here — he said that now is the time to finish the revolution that Washington and Bolivar commenced. How’s that for heresy? That is heresy and ignorance, because we have to remember — and I say this with all due respect to George Washington, who is historically one of the founding fathers of that country — but we must also remember the differences and how different George Washington and Simon Bolivar were, are and will always be.

George Washington won a war to gain the independence of the North American economic elite from the English empire, and when Washington died, or, rather, after his independence and after having been the president of the United States, after ordering the massacre of the indigenous peoples of North America, after defending slavery, he ended up being a very rich owner of slaves and of a plantation. He was a great landowner. That was George Washington.

Simon Bolivar, however, was born with a silver spoon, and at eight years old his parents died and he inherited a large fortune, together with his brothers, and he inherited haciendas and slaves. Simon Bolivar, when history led him — and as Karl Marx said, men can make history, but only as far as history allows us to do so — when history took Bolivar and made him the leader of the independence process in Venezuela, he made that process revolutionary. Simon Bolivar turned over all of his land. He freed all of his slaves, and he turned them into soldiers, and he brought them here. He brought them to Peru and Carabobo, and he worked together with the troops of San Martin to liberate this continent. That is Simon Bolivar.

And Simon Bolivar, having been born with that silver spoon in his mouth, when he died on the Caribbean coast of Colombia, when he died on December 17 in 1830, he was dressed with a shirt of someone else, because he had no clothes. Simon Bolivar is the leader of the revolution of this land. He is the leader of the social revolution, the people’s revolution, the historical revolution. George Washington has nothing — nothing — to do with this history.

It was in 1823 that James Monroe said, "America for the Americans." And when I say this tonight, I say it because I want to remind you, my brothers of Argentina, of Venezuela and of America, that the presence of the president of the United States in South America represents all of that. He represents that Monroe Doctrine of America for the Americans. Well, we will have to tell him: North America for the North Americans and South America for the South Americans. This is our America.

The president of the United States, that political cadaver — and when I say political cadaver, he would like to see me as a real cadaver — I want him to be a political cadaver, and he already is a political cadaver. The president of the United States has the lowest level of credibility and acceptance from his own people. He is the current president of the United States.

It would appear that he doesn’t even dare mention my name, because he was asked in Brasilia today in a press conference — I saw it, I watched it at the hotel — and the journalist asked him, "It is said that you are here to stop Chavez’s movement in South America." And it looked like he almost had a heart attack when he heard "Chavez," because he actually stuttered a couple of times, and he actually changed the subject. He didn’t answer the question. He didn’t answer the question at all. So he doesn’t even dare.

And I definitely dare to say his name. The president of the United States of North America, George W. Bush, the little gentleman of the North, the political cadaver that is visiting South America, that little gentleman is the president of all the history of the United States, and in the history of the United States, he has the lowest level of approval in his own country. And if we add that to the level of approval that he has in the world, I would think he’s in the red now — negative numbers.

AMYGOODMAN: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in Argentina on Friday, speaking before a mass rally of tens of thousands of people — an excerpt of that address. When we come back, response to the Latin American trip with Greg Grandin, who is author of Empire’s Workshop, a professor in Latin American studies. We’ll also speak with Steve Ellner, just back from Venezuela. Stay with us.

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Mon, 12 Mar 2007 00:00:00 -0400President Bush v. Hugo Chavez: A Discussion on the State of Politics in Latin Americahttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/3/12/president_bush_v_hugo_chavez_a
tag:democracynow.org,2007-03-12:en/story/4b60cf AMY GOODMAN : Greg Grandin is a professor of Latin American history at New York University, author of Empire&#8217;s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism . He also wrote The Blood of Guatemala: A History of Race and Nation . He joins me here in the firehouse studio. On the line with us, I&#8217;m joined by Steven Ellner. He has taught political science at the Universidad de Oriente in Venezuela since 1977, author of many books on Venezuela. His latest is called Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy . We welcome you both to Democracy Now!
Steve Ellner, let&#8217;s begin with you. You just came up from Venezuela last week. President Chavez gives this major anti-Bush address in Argentina and continues his shadow tour, shadowing President Bush as he travels through Latin America. When did this relationship go so bad between Venezuela and the United States?
STEVEN ELLNER : Well, Amy, let me say that Chavez had decent relations with President Clinton. Chavez was elected president in December of 1998. So Clinton was, you know, in office for two years, Chavez&#8217;s first two years. And even though the United States State Department denied Chavez a visa to travel to the United States to explain his platform during the campaign in &#39;97-&#39;98, when he was elected president, he did meet with Clinton twice, and they had cordial relations. Even though there were some differences between the two countries, they were cordial relations.
Things started going sour after 9/11 in 2001 when Chavez criticized the bombing of Afghanistan, and the United States momentarily withdrew its ambassador in Caracas. And Colin Powell started attacking Chavez. Chavez, on the other hand, did not respond in kind. He had, you know, very moderate words for Bush and the Bush administration. He wasn&#8217;t polemical. That led into the coup against Chavez in 2002, which the United States supported and justified. And even after the coup and even after there was so much evidence of U.S. support for the coup, to the extent that the U.S. ambassador met with the coup leader the day after the coup, Chavez was very moderate in his language. It was only in 2003 that &mdash; after the general strike against Chavez that lasted two months, that he started using the term &quot;anti-imperialism,&quot; and things quickly deteriorated after that.
AMY GOODMAN : Greg Grandin, you&#8217;ve been following this trip of President Bush and the shadow trip of President Chavez. But start off with why Bush is in Latin America today.
GREG GRANDIN : Well, it&#8217;s been presented as a response to Chavez, and I think that may be its most immediate cause, but I think you also have to step back and look at it in the wake of Bush&#8217;s disastrous failed global foreign policy, particularly the mess in Iraq. The U.S. has a long history of turning to Latin America to regroup after crises limit its power to project its influence beyond its borders. In this sense, a better metaphor for Latin America, rather than the U.S.&#39;s backyard, would be kind of United States&#39;s strategic reserve, the place where the United States turns to to regather its power, its energy, before turning back towards the world.
The first time the U.S. did this significantly was after the Great Depression, when Franklin Roosevelt turned to Latin America to elaborate the good neighbor policy, which became a kind of blueprint for liberal multilateralism, liberal internationalism, which then became the framework for U.S.&#8217;s global diplomacy after World War I &mdash; after World War II, excuse me.
Then in the 1980s, the Reagan administration turned to Latin America to kind of junk liberal multilateralism to rehabilitate American &quot;hard power,&quot; after the multiple crises of the 1970s. So here we are again at a kind of historical crossroads, a kind of recession of U.S. power in the world, caused by military overreach &mdash; crosses paths with a remobilized Latin America. And so, once again we have an administration turning its attentions to Latin America.
AMY GOODMAN : What about President Bush&#8217;s stressing ethanol? How significant is this, making an ethanol deal in Brazil, going to talk about it in Guatemala?
GREG GRANDIN : Yeah, I think this is the substance of the tour. I think the other stuff is really just fluff, as all of a sudden Bush has concern for social justice, that he feels Latin America&#8217;s pain. I mean, it&#8217;s a little &mdash; it&#8217;s kind of an anemic program that he&#8217;s offering. In many ways, it&#8217;s not Chavez that&#8217;s shadowing Bush, it&#8217;s Bush that&#8217;s shadowing Chavez, in terms of these social issues, the programs that he&#8217;s offering in terms of housing and education and healthcare &mdash; really minimal.
It&#8217;s the ethanol, which is key &mdash; ethanol and an attempt to kind of build up an alternative to Chavez in Brazil and in Uruguay. Ethanol is key to that because it solves a number of problems if it actually does advance. One is it clearly creates an alternative to oil, which is the base of Chavez&#8217;s power. But then, also, in order for the United States to meet its ethanol requirements, the goals that Bush laid out, it&#8217;s going to have to import most of the ethanol from foreign countries. If it relied just on corn production in the U.S., it would totally skew and throw off balance the United States&#8217;s complex food supply system. So it needs to turn to the Americas. So in many ways, when I say that Latin America is a strategic reserve, I&#8217;m not using it as a metaphor. It actually is, in terms of raw materials, when the United States is trying to turn Latin America into a supplier of ethanol.
And it&#8217;s not just Brazil. I think his trip to Guatemala, his including Guatemala in his itinerary, is telling, because Guatemala has one of the most advanced sugar industries in, not just in Central America, but in Latin America. It&#8217;s very competitive, very productive. And one of the things that has irked Guatemalan sugar producers is the tariffs that the U.S. continues to place on sugar imports from Latin America. This is a way, I think, of trying to kind of consolidate that, the sugar production, but specifically for ethanol and specifically as a way of importing ethanol in order not to throw off balance corn production and raise the price of grain in the United States.
AMY GOODMAN : Greg Grandin, I wanted to ask you, on a slightly separate issue, but this issue of the Salvador Option that is always talked about for Iraq, that includes the very same people, the military officer, Steele, who was in El Salvador in the 1980s, the training of the Green Berets, the secret working with the death squads of El Salvador, and talking about it as an option today in a positive light in Iraq.
GREG GRANDIN : Yeah. Well, I think it&#8217;s a euphemism for the imperial use of force and repression in order to restore order. The United States could talk all it wants about bringing democracy and meaningful development to the world. But the fact is that when opposition to its ambitions manifests itself, as an empire, as a superpower, it will resort to force and violence, often through proxies. That&#8217;s the Salvador Option. That&#8217;s what they mean by the Salvador Option: the use of repressive paramilitaries, repressive mercenaries, in order to establish authority, establish stability in the imperial periphery. And that&#8217;s what it means, and obviously it comes from El Salvador, a country most closely linked, identified with death squads. But it wasn&#8217;t just El Salvador. It was Chile and Argentina and Guatemala and many other countries in Latin America that resorted to the use of death squads often with the encouragement or tacit approval of the United States.
AMY GOODMAN : Steve Ellner, President Bush refusing to say Chavez&#8217;s name, something that Hugo Chavez commented on in this mass rally in Argentina, can you take us forward from Clinton&#8217;s relationship with Bush to the attempted coup against Chavez in 2002, and the role of the United States?
STEVEN ELLNER : Yes. The United States has openly, financially and politically supported the opposition to Chavez, and it has to be kept in mind that the opposition to Chavez is what political scientists call a &quot;disloyal&quot; opposition. That means an opposition that does not recognize the legitimacy of the government. It criticizes everything the government says and does without supporting any of the measures that might be considered positive for the country. It&#8217;s an intransigent opposition, and that opposition has received millions of dollars from the National Endowment for Democracy.
And this has had repercussions in Venezuelan politics. One of the things is that the opposition has become very closely identified with the United States. That is a negative for the Venezuelan opposition that Chavez has exploited. And the opposition has laid itself open to this kind of accusation. The opposition supports a lot of the things the Bush administration does. When the Bush administration denounces the violation of human rights in Venezuela, the opposition harps on that as if the United States is the authority on that issue, so that I think that the U.S. support for &mdash; open support for the Venezuelan opposition has really done the opposition a lot of harm.
AMY GOODMAN : And today, right now in Venezuela, one of the parts of the speech we didn&#8217;t play of Chavez, as he was talking about the fifth column, he was talking about those who ally themselves with North America in his own country, serving &mdash; what he talks about &mdash; North America as the United States&#8217;s interest. What about those classes in Venezuela?
STEVEN ELLNER : Well, yeah, I think that Chavez has exploited this issue of the close connection between not only the opposition parties but also specific interests in the U.S. government, and it just seems that every time that Chavez makes a statement against the opposition, criticizes the opposition, that the U.S. government is the center of attention, and that polarizes Venezuela even further. And this is true with the Venezuelan media industry, with the business organizations, with the church, all of which have clashed with Chavez. And the United States has openly supported the anti-Chavez position in each case.
AMY GOODMAN : Greg Grandin, how has Venezuela shaped the U.S.&#39;s entire approach now to Latin America? And do you believe that the U.S. is doing the same kind of thing to Chavez that it did to Castro for &mdash; well, for decades? We know about &mdash; what was it? &mdash; we&#39;re not talking about scores of, we&#8217;re talking about hundreds of attempts of assassination. This has all now been documented.
GREG GRANDIN : Well, Venezuela is certainly shaping the United States&#8217;s approach. Just you see it in this tour, where Bush has parroted the concern for social justice. And you&#8217;d be hard-pressed to say that that isn&#8217;t a response to the success of Chavez, to the popularity of Chavez, to the success of Venezuela&#8217;s social programs and diplomatic financial aid to Bolivia and Nicaragua.
The U.S., certainly &mdash; what&#8217;s interesting is actually what it&#8217;s not able to do, in comparison with Castro, where during the Cold War, the U.S. was able to isolate and get Latin America as a whole to quarantine, to sequester Castro in Cuba. It hasn&#8217;t had that success with Chavez, and that&#8217;s what&#8217;s interesting about the current moment and the weakness of the U.S.&#39;s position. It may mean that they will fall back on more hard power options like coups and covert activities, but in the meantime what&#39;s interesting is just the refusal of even allies like Uribe in Colombia &mdash; these are conservative governments &mdash; to isolate and criticize Chavez. Certainly Bachelet, Michelle Bachelet in Chile, Lula in Brazil, these countries have refused to work with Washington&#8217;s attempt to divide and rule in Latin America.
I think that actually speaks to the weakness of U.S. position in Latin America for a number of different reasons. One is, there&#8217;s an incredible amount of alternative sources of capital and investment. Latin America is no longer relying just on the IMF and just on New York creditors and United States financial institutions. There&#8217;s an incredible amount of capital built up in Asia, in Russia, in Europe, in the Middle East, that Latin America now has access to, this diversification of markets in Europe and these other areas that I just talked about, but also among the Latin American nations. So these countries aren&#8217;t as dependent on U.S. capital or U.S. market as they were in the past.
And that&#8217;s allowed an interesting degree of political independence among Latin American nations. They&#8217;ve roundly rejected &mdash; most countries &mdash; not only the invasion and occupation of Iraq, but the kind of ideological premise behind the war on terror, have refused to kind of substitute the war on terror for the Cold War. The Cold War served as a kind of organizing principle, which justified U.S. leadership. They&#8217;ve rejected the premises behind the war on terror. Even countries like Ecuador, prior to the recent election, which was ruled by a close ally of the U.S., and Colombia refused to sign onto the exception to the International Criminal Court that Washington has been asking Latin America to sign onto. This is an unprecedented degree of political autonomy from Washington&#8217;s leadership, and this is one of the reasons why I think Bush has resorted to a divide-and-rule strategy in Latin America, as opposed to marshaling the region collectively, as past administrations have tried to do.
AMY GOODMAN : Steve Ellner, do you think Iraq saved Latin America?
STEVEN ELLNER : Did what?
AMY GOODMAN : Did Iraq save Latin America?
STEVEN ELLNER : Did Iraq save South America?
AMY GOODMAN : Did Iraq save Latin America?
STEVEN ELLNER : OK. I think that it did take some of the pressure off. The United States undoubtedly would have backed up its hostile words for Chavez with more action after the coup in 2002 had it not been for Iraq. It&#8217;s impossible to say really what form that action would have taken. But in any case, I think that there was a period there in which Chavez still had not consolidated his power. Between the coup and the recall election that took place in August of 2004, Chavez&#8217;s position was not that solid, and the opposition in Venezuela was calling for Chavez&#8217;s overthrow or ouster, and that happened at the time of the general strike and then the recall campaign, so that during that two-year period, I think the United States might have played a more forceful role in opposition to Chavez, and that might have weakened his position.
But one thing to keep in mind, Amy, is that since 2004 Chavez is solidly in control, and the U.S. options are extremely limited. There is nothing the United States can do in order to destabilize or weaken Chavez&#8217;s position in Venezuela at this point. Things might change if the price of oil goes down or a number of other factors take place. But at this point Chavez is in solid control, in part because the opposition in Venezuela is so discredited and divided, as a matter of fact, at this point, so that the United States really can do very little to weaken Chavez&#8217;s position.
But it is true that during that crucial period, between the time of the coup, when the United States did actively support the effort to overthrow Chavez, and the recall election two-and-a-half years later, the United States may have been more effective in opposing Chavez, had it not been for our commitments in Iraq.
AMY GOODMAN : Greg Grandin, your response to that question? Did Iraq save Latin America?
GREG GRANDIN : Oh, I agree completely with what Steve just said. Iraq was part of a larger kind of confluence of events that have led to this deterioration of the U.S.&#39;s standing, and it&#39;s not just that Iraq diverted the U.S.&#39;s attention, which it did that also, but it also led to the decline in the U.S. dollar, which means the access to U.S. markets aren&#39;t as important as they were for Latin American economies in the past. The ability of the rise in price of oil, which is very &mdash; in a complex way related to the disaster of our foreign policy in Iraq, has led to the strengthening of this bloc that has allowed Chavez to serve as an alternative source of credit to Latin American nations, to Argentina and Ecuador and Brazil, weakening in turn the IMF .
I think there&#8217;s a lot of ways in which this disaster, this military overreach and kind of imperial hubris in Iraq, led to a kind of breathing space for Latin America, but I also think there are real structural changes taking place in the world that has led to the deterioration of the United States. Latin American nations have been very good recently at leveraging the kind of centrifugal forces of globalization in order to break free, give themselves some wiggle room, vis-à-vis Washington, vis-à-vis United States economy. I think this would have happened even without Iraq. I think Iraq maybe accelerated things.
I mean, Latin American leftists and even nonleftists, there&#8217;s a lot of differences in style and policy, which kind of mainstream commentators like to point out in showing that Chavez&#8217;s influence is limited, but I think they share a common set of &mdash; a common agenda that transcends those differences. One is, as I talked about, looking for a diversification of capital, a diversification of markets, regional integration, and then strengthening the role of the state in the economy to lessen inequality.
Going back to one of your earlier questions about Chavez setting the agenda for the United States is, one of the things that&#8217;s interesting about Bush&#8217;s rhetoric is his attention not just to growth, economic growth, but economic inequality. And this, I think, is one of the key shifts that the Latin American left can take credit for, is shifting the terms of the debate away from just growth to the deep, deep inequality of Latin America.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re going to come back to this conversation. We&#8217;re talking to Greg Grandin. He&#8217;s a professor of Latin American history at New York University, NYU . He also is the author of Empire&#8217;s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism . Steve Ellner is also with us. He&#8217;s co-author of the new book called Venezuela . This is Democracy Now! We&#8217;ll be back in a minute.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN : &mdash; Grandin, professor of Latin American studies at New York University. His book is called Empire&#8217;s Workshop . We&#8217;re also joined by Steve Ellner, just up from Venezuela, where he has taught for many years political science at the Universidad de Oriente in Puerto La Cruz in Venezuela, and he is co-author of the book Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy .
Professor Grandin, I wanted to ask you about this 20th anniversary that we just passed, the 20th anniversary of Iran-Contra, and what that has to do with Latin America and Iran today. And for people who are not familiar with what happened in November of 1986, explain it briefly.
GREG GRANDIN : Oh, in November 1986, the Iran-Contra scandal broke in the press. A small article in a Lebanese newspaper reported that the U.S.&#39;s rogue agents within the National Security Council of the U.S. sold missiles to Iran illegally, and then later on it was reported that the money was diverted to support the Contras, bypassing a congressional law prohibiting funding of the anti-communist mercenaries, which were set up to destabilize the Sandinista government. And a scandal went on for years and led to multiple investigations. But it kind of petered out in many ways. It didn&#39;t really damage the Republicans. George H.W. Bush was elected, I think, a month after the Senate report was released. He went on to pardon everybody who was convicted under Iran-Contra, including Elliott &mdash;- including a number of people in the current administration. What it has to do -&mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Elliott Abrams.
GREG GRANDIN : Elliott Abrams and a number of other people. What it has to do with the current moment is that Iran-Contra and Reagan&#8217;s Central American policy more broadly goes back to the point that I made earlier, that the United States turns to Latin America to regroup after crises, after global crises. And this was the Reagan administration, the rising new right, the rising conservative movement coming to power in early 1981, turning to Latin America to respond to the serial cascading crises of the 1970s &mdash; economic, political, a moral crisis, which really discredited American power in the world.
And Central America really becomes the crucible that brings together the different foreign policy constituents, which make up &mdash; which kind of stand behind George Bush&#8217;s post-9/11 kind of revolution in diplomatic affairs. In particular, it brought together for the first time first generation of neoconservative intellectuals and the religious right, and these are the two groups which give Bush&#8217;s pre-emptive warfare doctrine both its legal and intellectual legitimacy &mdash; that&#8217;s the neoconservatives &mdash; and its grassroots energy &mdash; and that&#8217;s the religious right. That alliance kind of comes apart after the election of George H.W. Bush and then obviously during the Clinton administration, but after 9/11 it reforms.
Iran-Contra really is about the conservative movement&#8217;s first sustained attempt to the restore the power of the imperial presidency to wage unencumbered, unauthorized war vis-à-vis the congressional and judicial branch, this kind of theory of strong executive power that&#8217;s now in the news that the Bush administration has been a staunch defender of. This really goes back in many ways to Iran-Contra as the first kind of sustained attempt to kind of roll back all of those restrictions placed on the executive branch in the wake of Vietnam and the wake of Watergate. And that&#8217;s what Iran-Contra was.
AMY GOODMAN : Well, Greg Grandin and Steve Ellner, I want to thank you both very much for joining us. Greg Grandin, the author of Empire&#8217;s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism , and Steve Ellner, who teaches political science in Venezuela and is co-author of the new book, Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy . AMYGOODMAN: Greg Grandin is a professor of Latin American history at New York University, author of Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism. He also wrote The Blood of Guatemala: A History of Race and Nation. He joins me here in the firehouse studio. On the line with us, I’m joined by Steven Ellner. He has taught political science at the Universidad de Oriente in Venezuela since 1977, author of many books on Venezuela. His latest is called Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy. We welcome you both to Democracy Now!

Steve Ellner, let’s begin with you. You just came up from Venezuela last week. President Chavez gives this major anti-Bush address in Argentina and continues his shadow tour, shadowing President Bush as he travels through Latin America. When did this relationship go so bad between Venezuela and the United States?

STEVENELLNER: Well, Amy, let me say that Chavez had decent relations with President Clinton. Chavez was elected president in December of 1998. So Clinton was, you know, in office for two years, Chavez’s first two years. And even though the United States State Department denied Chavez a visa to travel to the United States to explain his platform during the campaign in '97-'98, when he was elected president, he did meet with Clinton twice, and they had cordial relations. Even though there were some differences between the two countries, they were cordial relations.

Things started going sour after 9/11 in 2001 when Chavez criticized the bombing of Afghanistan, and the United States momentarily withdrew its ambassador in Caracas. And Colin Powell started attacking Chavez. Chavez, on the other hand, did not respond in kind. He had, you know, very moderate words for Bush and the Bush administration. He wasn’t polemical. That led into the coup against Chavez in 2002, which the United States supported and justified. And even after the coup and even after there was so much evidence of U.S. support for the coup, to the extent that the U.S. ambassador met with the coup leader the day after the coup, Chavez was very moderate in his language. It was only in 2003 that — after the general strike against Chavez that lasted two months, that he started using the term "anti-imperialism," and things quickly deteriorated after that.

AMYGOODMAN: Greg Grandin, you’ve been following this trip of President Bush and the shadow trip of President Chavez. But start off with why Bush is in Latin America today.

GREGGRANDIN: Well, it’s been presented as a response to Chavez, and I think that may be its most immediate cause, but I think you also have to step back and look at it in the wake of Bush’s disastrous failed global foreign policy, particularly the mess in Iraq. The U.S. has a long history of turning to Latin America to regroup after crises limit its power to project its influence beyond its borders. In this sense, a better metaphor for Latin America, rather than the U.S.'s backyard, would be kind of United States's strategic reserve, the place where the United States turns to to regather its power, its energy, before turning back towards the world.

The first time the U.S. did this significantly was after the Great Depression, when Franklin Roosevelt turned to Latin America to elaborate the good neighbor policy, which became a kind of blueprint for liberal multilateralism, liberal internationalism, which then became the framework for U.S.’s global diplomacy after World War I — after World War II, excuse me.

Then in the 1980s, the Reagan administration turned to Latin America to kind of junk liberal multilateralism to rehabilitate American "hard power," after the multiple crises of the 1970s. So here we are again at a kind of historical crossroads, a kind of recession of U.S. power in the world, caused by military overreach — crosses paths with a remobilized Latin America. And so, once again we have an administration turning its attentions to Latin America.

AMYGOODMAN: What about President Bush’s stressing ethanol? How significant is this, making an ethanol deal in Brazil, going to talk about it in Guatemala?

GREGGRANDIN: Yeah, I think this is the substance of the tour. I think the other stuff is really just fluff, as all of a sudden Bush has concern for social justice, that he feels Latin America’s pain. I mean, it’s a little — it’s kind of an anemic program that he’s offering. In many ways, it’s not Chavez that’s shadowing Bush, it’s Bush that’s shadowing Chavez, in terms of these social issues, the programs that he’s offering in terms of housing and education and healthcare — really minimal.

It’s the ethanol, which is key — ethanol and an attempt to kind of build up an alternative to Chavez in Brazil and in Uruguay. Ethanol is key to that because it solves a number of problems if it actually does advance. One is it clearly creates an alternative to oil, which is the base of Chavez’s power. But then, also, in order for the United States to meet its ethanol requirements, the goals that Bush laid out, it’s going to have to import most of the ethanol from foreign countries. If it relied just on corn production in the U.S., it would totally skew and throw off balance the United States’s complex food supply system. So it needs to turn to the Americas. So in many ways, when I say that Latin America is a strategic reserve, I’m not using it as a metaphor. It actually is, in terms of raw materials, when the United States is trying to turn Latin America into a supplier of ethanol.

And it’s not just Brazil. I think his trip to Guatemala, his including Guatemala in his itinerary, is telling, because Guatemala has one of the most advanced sugar industries in, not just in Central America, but in Latin America. It’s very competitive, very productive. And one of the things that has irked Guatemalan sugar producers is the tariffs that the U.S. continues to place on sugar imports from Latin America. This is a way, I think, of trying to kind of consolidate that, the sugar production, but specifically for ethanol and specifically as a way of importing ethanol in order not to throw off balance corn production and raise the price of grain in the United States.

AMYGOODMAN: Greg Grandin, I wanted to ask you, on a slightly separate issue, but this issue of the Salvador Option that is always talked about for Iraq, that includes the very same people, the military officer, Steele, who was in El Salvador in the 1980s, the training of the Green Berets, the secret working with the death squads of El Salvador, and talking about it as an option today in a positive light in Iraq.

GREGGRANDIN: Yeah. Well, I think it’s a euphemism for the imperial use of force and repression in order to restore order. The United States could talk all it wants about bringing democracy and meaningful development to the world. But the fact is that when opposition to its ambitions manifests itself, as an empire, as a superpower, it will resort to force and violence, often through proxies. That’s the Salvador Option. That’s what they mean by the Salvador Option: the use of repressive paramilitaries, repressive mercenaries, in order to establish authority, establish stability in the imperial periphery. And that’s what it means, and obviously it comes from El Salvador, a country most closely linked, identified with death squads. But it wasn’t just El Salvador. It was Chile and Argentina and Guatemala and many other countries in Latin America that resorted to the use of death squads often with the encouragement or tacit approval of the United States.

AMYGOODMAN: Steve Ellner, President Bush refusing to say Chavez’s name, something that Hugo Chavez commented on in this mass rally in Argentina, can you take us forward from Clinton’s relationship with Bush to the attempted coup against Chavez in 2002, and the role of the United States?

STEVENELLNER: Yes. The United States has openly, financially and politically supported the opposition to Chavez, and it has to be kept in mind that the opposition to Chavez is what political scientists call a "disloyal" opposition. That means an opposition that does not recognize the legitimacy of the government. It criticizes everything the government says and does without supporting any of the measures that might be considered positive for the country. It’s an intransigent opposition, and that opposition has received millions of dollars from the National Endowment for Democracy.

And this has had repercussions in Venezuelan politics. One of the things is that the opposition has become very closely identified with the United States. That is a negative for the Venezuelan opposition that Chavez has exploited. And the opposition has laid itself open to this kind of accusation. The opposition supports a lot of the things the Bush administration does. When the Bush administration denounces the violation of human rights in Venezuela, the opposition harps on that as if the United States is the authority on that issue, so that I think that the U.S. support for — open support for the Venezuelan opposition has really done the opposition a lot of harm.

AMYGOODMAN: And today, right now in Venezuela, one of the parts of the speech we didn’t play of Chavez, as he was talking about the fifth column, he was talking about those who ally themselves with North America in his own country, serving — what he talks about — North America as the United States’s interest. What about those classes in Venezuela?

STEVENELLNER: Well, yeah, I think that Chavez has exploited this issue of the close connection between not only the opposition parties but also specific interests in the U.S. government, and it just seems that every time that Chavez makes a statement against the opposition, criticizes the opposition, that the U.S. government is the center of attention, and that polarizes Venezuela even further. And this is true with the Venezuelan media industry, with the business organizations, with the church, all of which have clashed with Chavez. And the United States has openly supported the anti-Chavez position in each case.

AMYGOODMAN: Greg Grandin, how has Venezuela shaped the U.S.'s entire approach now to Latin America? And do you believe that the U.S. is doing the same kind of thing to Chavez that it did to Castro for — well, for decades? We know about — what was it? — we're not talking about scores of, we’re talking about hundreds of attempts of assassination. This has all now been documented.

GREGGRANDIN: Well, Venezuela is certainly shaping the United States’s approach. Just you see it in this tour, where Bush has parroted the concern for social justice. And you’d be hard-pressed to say that that isn’t a response to the success of Chavez, to the popularity of Chavez, to the success of Venezuela’s social programs and diplomatic financial aid to Bolivia and Nicaragua.

The U.S., certainly — what’s interesting is actually what it’s not able to do, in comparison with Castro, where during the Cold War, the U.S. was able to isolate and get Latin America as a whole to quarantine, to sequester Castro in Cuba. It hasn’t had that success with Chavez, and that’s what’s interesting about the current moment and the weakness of the U.S.'s position. It may mean that they will fall back on more hard power options like coups and covert activities, but in the meantime what's interesting is just the refusal of even allies like Uribe in Colombia — these are conservative governments — to isolate and criticize Chavez. Certainly Bachelet, Michelle Bachelet in Chile, Lula in Brazil, these countries have refused to work with Washington’s attempt to divide and rule in Latin America.

I think that actually speaks to the weakness of U.S. position in Latin America for a number of different reasons. One is, there’s an incredible amount of alternative sources of capital and investment. Latin America is no longer relying just on the IMF and just on New York creditors and United States financial institutions. There’s an incredible amount of capital built up in Asia, in Russia, in Europe, in the Middle East, that Latin America now has access to, this diversification of markets in Europe and these other areas that I just talked about, but also among the Latin American nations. So these countries aren’t as dependent on U.S. capital or U.S. market as they were in the past.

And that’s allowed an interesting degree of political independence among Latin American nations. They’ve roundly rejected — most countries — not only the invasion and occupation of Iraq, but the kind of ideological premise behind the war on terror, have refused to kind of substitute the war on terror for the Cold War. The Cold War served as a kind of organizing principle, which justified U.S. leadership. They’ve rejected the premises behind the war on terror. Even countries like Ecuador, prior to the recent election, which was ruled by a close ally of the U.S., and Colombia refused to sign onto the exception to the International Criminal Court that Washington has been asking Latin America to sign onto. This is an unprecedented degree of political autonomy from Washington’s leadership, and this is one of the reasons why I think Bush has resorted to a divide-and-rule strategy in Latin America, as opposed to marshaling the region collectively, as past administrations have tried to do.

AMYGOODMAN: Steve Ellner, do you think Iraq saved Latin America?

STEVENELLNER: Did what?

AMYGOODMAN: Did Iraq save Latin America?

STEVENELLNER: Did Iraq save South America?

AMYGOODMAN: Did Iraq save Latin America?

STEVENELLNER: OK. I think that it did take some of the pressure off. The United States undoubtedly would have backed up its hostile words for Chavez with more action after the coup in 2002 had it not been for Iraq. It’s impossible to say really what form that action would have taken. But in any case, I think that there was a period there in which Chavez still had not consolidated his power. Between the coup and the recall election that took place in August of 2004, Chavez’s position was not that solid, and the opposition in Venezuela was calling for Chavez’s overthrow or ouster, and that happened at the time of the general strike and then the recall campaign, so that during that two-year period, I think the United States might have played a more forceful role in opposition to Chavez, and that might have weakened his position.

But one thing to keep in mind, Amy, is that since 2004 Chavez is solidly in control, and the U.S. options are extremely limited. There is nothing the United States can do in order to destabilize or weaken Chavez’s position in Venezuela at this point. Things might change if the price of oil goes down or a number of other factors take place. But at this point Chavez is in solid control, in part because the opposition in Venezuela is so discredited and divided, as a matter of fact, at this point, so that the United States really can do very little to weaken Chavez’s position.

But it is true that during that crucial period, between the time of the coup, when the United States did actively support the effort to overthrow Chavez, and the recall election two-and-a-half years later, the United States may have been more effective in opposing Chavez, had it not been for our commitments in Iraq.

GREGGRANDIN: Oh, I agree completely with what Steve just said. Iraq was part of a larger kind of confluence of events that have led to this deterioration of the U.S.'s standing, and it's not just that Iraq diverted the U.S.'s attention, which it did that also, but it also led to the decline in the U.S. dollar, which means the access to U.S. markets aren't as important as they were for Latin American economies in the past. The ability of the rise in price of oil, which is very — in a complex way related to the disaster of our foreign policy in Iraq, has led to the strengthening of this bloc that has allowed Chavez to serve as an alternative source of credit to Latin American nations, to Argentina and Ecuador and Brazil, weakening in turn the IMF.

I think there’s a lot of ways in which this disaster, this military overreach and kind of imperial hubris in Iraq, led to a kind of breathing space for Latin America, but I also think there are real structural changes taking place in the world that has led to the deterioration of the United States. Latin American nations have been very good recently at leveraging the kind of centrifugal forces of globalization in order to break free, give themselves some wiggle room, vis-à-vis Washington, vis-à-vis United States economy. I think this would have happened even without Iraq. I think Iraq maybe accelerated things.

I mean, Latin American leftists and even nonleftists, there’s a lot of differences in style and policy, which kind of mainstream commentators like to point out in showing that Chavez’s influence is limited, but I think they share a common set of — a common agenda that transcends those differences. One is, as I talked about, looking for a diversification of capital, a diversification of markets, regional integration, and then strengthening the role of the state in the economy to lessen inequality.

Going back to one of your earlier questions about Chavez setting the agenda for the United States is, one of the things that’s interesting about Bush’s rhetoric is his attention not just to growth, economic growth, but economic inequality. And this, I think, is one of the key shifts that the Latin American left can take credit for, is shifting the terms of the debate away from just growth to the deep, deep inequality of Latin America.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re going to come back to this conversation. We’re talking to Greg Grandin. He’s a professor of Latin American history at New York University, NYU. He also is the author of Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism. Steve Ellner is also with us. He’s co-author of the new book called Venezuela. This is Democracy Now! We’ll be back in a minute.

[break]

AMYGOODMAN: — Grandin, professor of Latin American studies at New York University. His book is called Empire’s Workshop. We’re also joined by Steve Ellner, just up from Venezuela, where he has taught for many years political science at the Universidad de Oriente in Puerto La Cruz in Venezuela, and he is co-author of the book Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy.

Professor Grandin, I wanted to ask you about this 20th anniversary that we just passed, the 20th anniversary of Iran-Contra, and what that has to do with Latin America and Iran today. And for people who are not familiar with what happened in November of 1986, explain it briefly.

GREGGRANDIN: Oh, in November 1986, the Iran-Contra scandal broke in the press. A small article in a Lebanese newspaper reported that the U.S.'s rogue agents within the National Security Council of the U.S. sold missiles to Iran illegally, and then later on it was reported that the money was diverted to support the Contras, bypassing a congressional law prohibiting funding of the anti-communist mercenaries, which were set up to destabilize the Sandinista government. And a scandal went on for years and led to multiple investigations. But it kind of petered out in many ways. It didn't really damage the Republicans. George H.W. Bush was elected, I think, a month after the Senate report was released. He went on to pardon everybody who was convicted under Iran-Contra, including Elliott —- including a number of people in the current administration. What it has to do -—

AMYGOODMAN: Elliott Abrams.

GREGGRANDIN: Elliott Abrams and a number of other people. What it has to do with the current moment is that Iran-Contra and Reagan’s Central American policy more broadly goes back to the point that I made earlier, that the United States turns to Latin America to regroup after crises, after global crises. And this was the Reagan administration, the rising new right, the rising conservative movement coming to power in early 1981, turning to Latin America to respond to the serial cascading crises of the 1970s — economic, political, a moral crisis, which really discredited American power in the world.

And Central America really becomes the crucible that brings together the different foreign policy constituents, which make up — which kind of stand behind George Bush’s post-9/11 kind of revolution in diplomatic affairs. In particular, it brought together for the first time first generation of neoconservative intellectuals and the religious right, and these are the two groups which give Bush’s pre-emptive warfare doctrine both its legal and intellectual legitimacy — that’s the neoconservatives — and its grassroots energy — and that’s the religious right. That alliance kind of comes apart after the election of George H.W. Bush and then obviously during the Clinton administration, but after 9/11 it reforms.

Iran-Contra really is about the conservative movement’s first sustained attempt to the restore the power of the imperial presidency to wage unencumbered, unauthorized war vis-à-vis the congressional and judicial branch, this kind of theory of strong executive power that’s now in the news that the Bush administration has been a staunch defender of. This really goes back in many ways to Iran-Contra as the first kind of sustained attempt to kind of roll back all of those restrictions placed on the executive branch in the wake of Vietnam and the wake of Watergate. And that’s what Iran-Contra was.

AMYGOODMAN: Well, Greg Grandin and Steve Ellner, I want to thank you both very much for joining us. Greg Grandin, the author of Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism, and Steve Ellner, who teaches political science in Venezuela and is co-author of the new book, Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy.

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Mon, 12 Mar 2007 00:00:00 -0400Protests Sweep Latin America as Bush Begins Five-Nation Tourhttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/3/9/protests_sweep_latin_america_as_bush
tag:democracynow.org,2007-03-09:en/story/448448 JUAN GONZALEZ : Protests have begun across Latin America as President Bush begins a five-nation tour. In Brazil, over 30,000 people took to the streets of Sao Paulo on Thursday. Demonstrations have already broken out in Colombia, and more protests are scheduled in Uruguay, Guatemala and Mexico.
Today, we&#8217;re going to take a look extensively at President Bush&#8217;s visit to the region. In a few minutes, we will be joined by a leading member of the opposition in Colombia, but first we go to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, where protesters are preparing for President Bush&#8217;s visit. Michael Fox joins us on the phone. He&#8217;s a journalist based in South America who has reported for Free Speech Radio News, The Nation and ZNet . He&#8217;s a former staff writer at venezuelanalysis.com . Welcome to Democracy Now! , Michael.
MICHAEL FOX : Thank you so much.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Well, what&#8217;s the situation right there in Montevideo, as President Bush&#8217;s arrival comes soon?
MICHAEL FOX : Things are pretty calm this morning. You have, essentially &mdash; I&#8217;m about two blocks away from Independence Plaza, which is where Bush is going to be staying at the Radisson Hotel. You&#8217;ve got barricades up surrounding the plaza, which are &mdash; you know, you have free access to head in and out of the region, but within the next couple of hours, they say, they should be closing things off for about a 10-block radius for anyone who doesn&#8217;t live in the region.
JUAN GONZALEZ : And how has the new government, a relatively progressive government, been handling the buildup of the protest and obviously the need to sit down and negotiate with President Bush?
MICHAEL FOX : That&#8217;s a good question. Frente Amplio, which is the coalition of leftist forces, which is in government power here since 2004, it&#8217;s a complicated issue, because you&#8217;ve got some sectors such as Marina Arismendi, which is the minister of development and the Communist Party leader, who said that Bush represents essentially the murder and the militarists in the world. And you have others, such as the minister of economy, Danilo Astori, who is ready to sign a free trade agreement with the United States. So it&#8217;s a complicated issue. Frente has decided that they&#8217;re not going to support or call for any of their supporters to head out in the marches, but they&#8217;re also not going to ask them not to go. So you have some leaders of Frente, such as Senator Enrique Rubio, who are going to be in the marches tonight.
AMY GOODMAN : Michael Fox, what sense do you have in Uruguay, how much coverage is there of the protests across Latin America, and also what Hugo Chavez is doing, the Venezuelan president, going to Argentina to lead an anti-Bush rally?
MICHAEL FOX : You know, there&#8217;s coverage. There&#8217;s not a whole lot of coverage, but, I mean, obviously everybody is focused on Bush&#8217;s visit, and everybody realizes that there&#8217;s going to be protests arriving. Also, obviously, the fact that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is just across the Rio de la Plata and is going to be speaking before 40,000 people tomorrow, at the same time as Uruguayan President Tabare Vasquez is meeting with Bush, it means a lot. And most people in Uruguay are very aware about, you know, the present situation in Bush&#8217;s trip across Latin America.
JUAN GONZALEZ : Also, while there are many progressive governments now in the region, there are also contradictions among them. Uruguay has some contradictions with Brazil and Argentina, doesn&#8217;t it? Could you talk about that a little bit?
MICHAEL FOX : It&#8217;s got huge contradictions. Uruguay is, you know, a country of approximately 3.6 million people, which compares to Brazil&#8217;s 300 million &mdash; is tiny. They&#8217;re right now trying to push &mdash; you know, to find some sort of comparative advantage in the region. At the same time, you&#8217;ve got &mdash; although they make up Mercosur, which is made up of Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela, it&#8217;s a difficult situation, because it&#8217;s a tiny country trying to fight for some sort of market. And right now, you know, one of the things they&#8217;re going to be talking with Bush, you know, is that access. Right now, U.S. is Uruguay&#8217;s number one trading partner, directly after the Mercosur countries. So some folks in Frente, including Uruguay&#8217;s President Tabare Vasquez, are looking to open up those doors to U.S. free trade. Of course, what that would mean for Mercosur, which is, you know, this economic trading bloc in South America, it&#8217;s difficult to say.
AMY GOODMAN : Michael Fox, I want to thank you very much for being with us, freelance journalist based in Uruguay, reported extensively from Venezuela for venezuelanalysis.com , Free Speech Radio News, and The Nation and ZNet . JUANGONZALEZ: Protests have begun across Latin America as President Bush begins a five-nation tour. In Brazil, over 30,000 people took to the streets of Sao Paulo on Thursday. Demonstrations have already broken out in Colombia, and more protests are scheduled in Uruguay, Guatemala and Mexico.

Today, we’re going to take a look extensively at President Bush’s visit to the region. In a few minutes, we will be joined by a leading member of the opposition in Colombia, but first we go to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, where protesters are preparing for President Bush’s visit. Michael Fox joins us on the phone. He’s a journalist based in South America who has reported for Free Speech Radio News, The Nation and ZNet. He’s a former staff writer at venezuelanalysis.com. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Michael.

MICHAELFOX: Thank you so much.

JUANGONZALEZ: Well, what’s the situation right there in Montevideo, as President Bush’s arrival comes soon?

MICHAELFOX: Things are pretty calm this morning. You have, essentially — I’m about two blocks away from Independence Plaza, which is where Bush is going to be staying at the Radisson Hotel. You’ve got barricades up surrounding the plaza, which are — you know, you have free access to head in and out of the region, but within the next couple of hours, they say, they should be closing things off for about a 10-block radius for anyone who doesn’t live in the region.

JUANGONZALEZ: And how has the new government, a relatively progressive government, been handling the buildup of the protest and obviously the need to sit down and negotiate with President Bush?

MICHAELFOX: That’s a good question. Frente Amplio, which is the coalition of leftist forces, which is in government power here since 2004, it’s a complicated issue, because you’ve got some sectors such as Marina Arismendi, which is the minister of development and the Communist Party leader, who said that Bush represents essentially the murder and the militarists in the world. And you have others, such as the minister of economy, Danilo Astori, who is ready to sign a free trade agreement with the United States. So it’s a complicated issue. Frente has decided that they’re not going to support or call for any of their supporters to head out in the marches, but they’re also not going to ask them not to go. So you have some leaders of Frente, such as Senator Enrique Rubio, who are going to be in the marches tonight.

AMYGOODMAN: Michael Fox, what sense do you have in Uruguay, how much coverage is there of the protests across Latin America, and also what Hugo Chavez is doing, the Venezuelan president, going to Argentina to lead an anti-Bush rally?

MICHAELFOX: You know, there’s coverage. There’s not a whole lot of coverage, but, I mean, obviously everybody is focused on Bush’s visit, and everybody realizes that there’s going to be protests arriving. Also, obviously, the fact that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is just across the Rio de la Plata and is going to be speaking before 40,000 people tomorrow, at the same time as Uruguayan President Tabare Vasquez is meeting with Bush, it means a lot. And most people in Uruguay are very aware about, you know, the present situation in Bush’s trip across Latin America.

JUANGONZALEZ: Also, while there are many progressive governments now in the region, there are also contradictions among them. Uruguay has some contradictions with Brazil and Argentina, doesn’t it? Could you talk about that a little bit?

MICHAELFOX: It’s got huge contradictions. Uruguay is, you know, a country of approximately 3.6 million people, which compares to Brazil’s 300 million — is tiny. They’re right now trying to push — you know, to find some sort of comparative advantage in the region. At the same time, you’ve got — although they make up Mercosur, which is made up of Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela, it’s a difficult situation, because it’s a tiny country trying to fight for some sort of market. And right now, you know, one of the things they’re going to be talking with Bush, you know, is that access. Right now, U.S. is Uruguay’s number one trading partner, directly after the Mercosur countries. So some folks in Frente, including Uruguay’s President Tabare Vasquez, are looking to open up those doors to U.S. free trade. Of course, what that would mean for Mercosur, which is, you know, this economic trading bloc in South America, it’s difficult to say.

AMYGOODMAN: Michael Fox, I want to thank you very much for being with us, freelance journalist based in Uruguay, reported extensively from Venezuela for venezuelanalysis.com, Free Speech Radio News, and The Nation and ZNet.

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Fri, 09 Mar 2007 00:00:00 -0500Do Chavez's New Decree Powers Undermine Venezuelan Democracy? A Debatehttp://www.democracynow.org/2007/2/2/do_chavezs_new_decree_powers_undermine
tag:democracynow.org,2007-02-02:en/story/743748 AMY GOODMAN : Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced Thursday his government would move toward nationalizing major parts of the country&#8217;s oil industry. Beginning on May 1st, Chavez said the government will take majority control of oil projects in the Orinoco River basin. The move will affect several major international oil companies, including Chevron, ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips and BP. The announcement came just one day after the Venezuelan National Assembly agreed to Chavez&#8217;s request that he be allowed to rule by decree for the next 18 months. The legislation will allow Chavez to transform 11 areas, including the economy and defense.
Since being re-elected in December with 63 percent of the vote, Chavez has put forward a series of sweeping reforms that will lay the groundwork for what he describes as &quot;Bolivarian socialism.&quot; Chavez says that with this added authority he&#8217;ll also plan to nationalize Venezuela&#8217;s largest telecommunications company and the electricity sector.
Critics of the measure say it gives Chavez far too much authority. They predict that nationalizing Venezuela&#8217;s industries will ultimately stunt Venezuela&#8217;s economic growth. President Bush told Fox News earlier this week, quote, &quot;I am concerned about the undermining of democratic institutions. And we&#8217;re working to help prevent that from happening.&quot;
To discuss the situation in Venezuela, we turn to two guests: James Petras is professor emeritus of sociology and Latin America studies at SUNY Binghamton, author of the book Social Movements and State Power ; Francisco Rodriguez is assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University and the former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. We welcome you both to Democracy Now!
Let&#8217;s begin in the studio in Hartford with Francisco Rodriguez. Your concerns right now about the move, the National Assembly granting Chavez the power to rule by decree?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Well, I think that what&#8217;s happening in Venezuela is that President Chavez has increased his scope of power and has increased the concentration of power in his person, and it&#8217;s a gradual process that we&#8217;ve seen happening over the past few years, where the Supreme Court is under the control of his followers, the Assembly is 100 percent &mdash; all of the members of the Assembly are backers of President Chavez. The Electoral Council is very clearly stacked with his followers. The former president of the Electoral Council, who supervised the 2004 vote count, is now his vice president. And this is just one more step, in which the president is concentrating power. He doesn&#8217;t really even trust his Assembly, even though it&#8217;s filled with his backers, and he wants to be able to legislate directly.
Now, this figure of enabling law, the law that enables the president to rule by decree, has been used previously in Venezuela, but in the past it used to be very well circumscribed to specific areas of legislation, such as during the debt crisis. The president was granted authority to legislate on particular economic issues. But now what we&#8217;re seeing is an enabling law that will allow President Chavez to rule by decree in just about every area of the Venezuelan economy and society. It&#8217;s couched in very vague terms, such as social and economic rights transforming state institutions. For the first time in history, the president will have the right to rewrite organic laws, which are laws of constitutional rank, which generally would take a two-thirds majority in the Assembly to change them, but now he will be allowed to do that by decree. So we are seeing a lot of power put in the hands of the president, and we&#8217;re seeing something very close to the end of any type of separation of power in Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN : Professor James Petras, your response?
JAMES PETRAS : These measures, as was mentioned, have a precedent in the past, because there&#8217;s a great deal of gridlock in the legislative process. Many of the Assembly members, though formerly Chavistas, run the gamut from Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, leftists, and all sorts of other variants. So I think what he&#8217;s doing is what a lot of presidents do, is taking &mdash; asking and securing fast-track powers to push through an agenda. It&#8217;s not very different from what U.S. presidents have done in the past to seek extra powers to deal with emergencies or opportunities to bring about significant changes.
I think this is important also because his social programs have advanced enormously in terms of reduction of prices for consumers in low-income neighborhoods, the vast expansion of the health system, etc. And I think what the people are demanding is that these social measures be accompanied by structural changes, which give Venezuela effective control.
Now, if you look at the specific measures, the 60 percent share of the oil industry, these are joint ventures, and I think it needs to be emphasized that the model of 21st century socialism that Chavez has outlined is simply in line with a mixed economy. Nationalizing the electric power is not something unusual, because it allows the government to lower costs for downstream enterprises, and I think the telecommunications also is a factor in spurring new investments and profits downstream. I think, again, this business about concentrating power &mdash; let&#8217;s not forget that Chavez was elected with 63 percent of the electorate. He has a mandate, and this, to me, is a kind of plebiscite to him to get on with structural changes and not merely welfare measures.
AMY GOODMAN : But, Professor Petras, why does he have to rule by decree if he has that kind of support and that kind of support in the Legislature? Why not just have them vote on these issues that they would support?
JAMES PETRAS : Well, because, as I mentioned, Amy, the Legislature is formerly Chavista, but they have proved really incompetent or dilatory in carrying out programs and implementing them. I could mention a host of areas where Congress has lagged behind &mdash; for instance, job creation programs, house building, etc. Chavez lays out a legislative agenda, and the people are very supportive of it, the electorate, as is demonstrated, and yet the Congress, even the Chavez Congress, has not been an effective instrument for carrying out these policies. I draw your attention to &mdash; in a different context &mdash; the demand by Presidents Clinton, Bush, and whoever, for fast-track powers to negotiate huge trade agreements. And that&#8217;s because they recognize that special interests and congressional delays can undermine the entire project and destroy public confidence in the elected officials.
AMY GOODMAN : Francisco Rodriguez, your response?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Well, I think that it&#8217;s very strange to me to talk about gridlock in an Assembly where every single member is a Chavista, where there is not one member who is a representative of the opposition. I do think that there is &mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : They boycotted the election, is that right?
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : No, no. That&#8217;s right. They boycotted the election. I&#8217;m just saying that talking about gridlock in that type of Assembly, where there&#8217;s not even one member of the opposition, seems to me to be somewhat strange. Now, they boycotted the election, because the Electoral Council that was counting the votes was, among others, headed by Mr. Jorge Rodriguez, who is now the vice president of President Chavez and a very close supporter and ally.
Now, I think that the fundamental question here is whether there is a value to the separation of powers. Why do we believe that the legislative power should be separated from the judicial power and it should be separated from the executive power? Because we believe that even though a president might be able to win an election with a very large number of votes, which, by the way, there are many interpretations of why that happens. Venezuela is also riding an economic boom, caused by an expansion, a five-fold expansion in oil prices. So, under favorable economic conditions, presidents get re-elected without that necessarily meaning that there&#8217;s a mandate to construct a socialist society. But if we think that there is some value to a separation of powers, then we should be very weary about presidents taking authority which is commonly in the sphere of legislative power.
Now, I would just like to point out that, with respect to the success of the social programs that Professor Petras points to, it&#8217;s actually very hard to tell how successful these programs have been, and there&#8217;s very little serious research that has been done on the subject. There&#8217;s a lot of government propaganda. So the government claims that it taught 1.5 million people how to read and write, but there&#8217;s really very little way to verify that kind of claims. The research that my colleagues and I have done at Wesleyan and University of Berkeley and the development fund have found that the claims of the government, at least with respect to a literacy program, have been completely overblown. Using the government&#8217;s own household surveys, which have measures of illiteracy, we&#8217;d find almost no decline in illiteracy during the period during which the literacy program was applied. We&#8217;ve also seen that there has been an increase in the number of Venezuelan children who are underheight and underweight. We&#8217;ve analyzed the structure of social spending &mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Professor Rodriguez, I wanted to ask your thoughts on the nationalizing of the oil. I mean, you have here President Chavez taking on the most powerful corporations on earth, ExxonMobil, Chevron, etc.
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ : Well, actually, there, I would not disagree with Professor Petras. I think that nationalizing the oil industry, as it was done in the &#39;70s in Venezuela under the government of Carlos Andres Perez &mdash; many governments have chosen to have national telecommunications industries, national electricity, so I don&#39;t think that really the crux of the issue lies there. Actually, Chavez is a very skillful political strategist, and I would entertain the hypothesis that probably he wants to get people talking about this, because he knows that there are a lot more important things that are going on in Venezuela, which maybe they won&#8217;t to talk about if they&#8217;re centering around the nationalization.
Here&#8217;s what worries me. The minister of labor, in a January 12 interview in the national newspaper, Universal , said that they&#8217;re working on legislation to include community and workers&#8217; council participation, not only in the decision, but in the profits of all private firms. That&#8217;s something that I find very worrying. It worries me that the government is closing down the nation&#8217;s oldest private TV station without any type of judicial process, because it accuses it of having participated in the coup, even though there hasn&#8217;t been a judicial process to prove that. It&#8217;s being closed down, and it&#8217;s going to be replaced by a state-run TV station. Also, I think that we are seeing &mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Well, we have to wrap up. Let&#8217;s get a response from Professor Petras on that point of the closing of the TV station.
JAMES PETRAS : I think that the professor has left out some contextual variables that are crucially important. The closing down or the termination of the license for the television station is related to the fact the television station was urging on a nonviolent overthrow of the government, elected government, of Venezuela back in 2002. This may be a little late in actually carrying out the law, but I don&#8217;t know any democratic government in the world &mdash; Western Europe, North America, Latin America, or elsewhere &mdash;- which allows a -&mdash;
AMY GOODMAN : Professor Petras, we&#8217;re going to have to leave it there. Professors Petras and Rodriguez, I want to thank you both for being with us. AMYGOODMAN: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced Thursday his government would move toward nationalizing major parts of the country’s oil industry. Beginning on May 1st, Chavez said the government will take majority control of oil projects in the Orinoco River basin. The move will affect several major international oil companies, including Chevron, ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips and BP. The announcement came just one day after the Venezuelan National Assembly agreed to Chavez’s request that he be allowed to rule by decree for the next 18 months. The legislation will allow Chavez to transform 11 areas, including the economy and defense.

Since being re-elected in December with 63 percent of the vote, Chavez has put forward a series of sweeping reforms that will lay the groundwork for what he describes as "Bolivarian socialism." Chavez says that with this added authority he’ll also plan to nationalize Venezuela’s largest telecommunications company and the electricity sector.

Critics of the measure say it gives Chavez far too much authority. They predict that nationalizing Venezuela’s industries will ultimately stunt Venezuela’s economic growth. President Bush told Fox News earlier this week, quote, "I am concerned about the undermining of democratic institutions. And we’re working to help prevent that from happening."

To discuss the situation in Venezuela, we turn to two guests: James Petras is professor emeritus of sociology and Latin America studies at SUNY Binghamton, author of the book Social Movements and State Power; Francisco Rodriguez is assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University and the former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. We welcome you both to Democracy Now!

Let’s begin in the studio in Hartford with Francisco Rodriguez. Your concerns right now about the move, the National Assembly granting Chavez the power to rule by decree?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: Well, I think that what’s happening in Venezuela is that President Chavez has increased his scope of power and has increased the concentration of power in his person, and it’s a gradual process that we’ve seen happening over the past few years, where the Supreme Court is under the control of his followers, the Assembly is 100 percent — all of the members of the Assembly are backers of President Chavez. The Electoral Council is very clearly stacked with his followers. The former president of the Electoral Council, who supervised the 2004 vote count, is now his vice president. And this is just one more step, in which the president is concentrating power. He doesn’t really even trust his Assembly, even though it’s filled with his backers, and he wants to be able to legislate directly.

Now, this figure of enabling law, the law that enables the president to rule by decree, has been used previously in Venezuela, but in the past it used to be very well circumscribed to specific areas of legislation, such as during the debt crisis. The president was granted authority to legislate on particular economic issues. But now what we’re seeing is an enabling law that will allow President Chavez to rule by decree in just about every area of the Venezuelan economy and society. It’s couched in very vague terms, such as social and economic rights transforming state institutions. For the first time in history, the president will have the right to rewrite organic laws, which are laws of constitutional rank, which generally would take a two-thirds majority in the Assembly to change them, but now he will be allowed to do that by decree. So we are seeing a lot of power put in the hands of the president, and we’re seeing something very close to the end of any type of separation of power in Venezuela.

AMYGOODMAN: Professor James Petras, your response?

JAMESPETRAS: These measures, as was mentioned, have a precedent in the past, because there’s a great deal of gridlock in the legislative process. Many of the Assembly members, though formerly Chavistas, run the gamut from Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, leftists, and all sorts of other variants. So I think what he’s doing is what a lot of presidents do, is taking — asking and securing fast-track powers to push through an agenda. It’s not very different from what U.S. presidents have done in the past to seek extra powers to deal with emergencies or opportunities to bring about significant changes.

I think this is important also because his social programs have advanced enormously in terms of reduction of prices for consumers in low-income neighborhoods, the vast expansion of the health system, etc. And I think what the people are demanding is that these social measures be accompanied by structural changes, which give Venezuela effective control.

Now, if you look at the specific measures, the 60 percent share of the oil industry, these are joint ventures, and I think it needs to be emphasized that the model of 21st century socialism that Chavez has outlined is simply in line with a mixed economy. Nationalizing the electric power is not something unusual, because it allows the government to lower costs for downstream enterprises, and I think the telecommunications also is a factor in spurring new investments and profits downstream. I think, again, this business about concentrating power — let’s not forget that Chavez was elected with 63 percent of the electorate. He has a mandate, and this, to me, is a kind of plebiscite to him to get on with structural changes and not merely welfare measures.

AMYGOODMAN: But, Professor Petras, why does he have to rule by decree if he has that kind of support and that kind of support in the Legislature? Why not just have them vote on these issues that they would support?

JAMESPETRAS: Well, because, as I mentioned, Amy, the Legislature is formerly Chavista, but they have proved really incompetent or dilatory in carrying out programs and implementing them. I could mention a host of areas where Congress has lagged behind — for instance, job creation programs, house building, etc. Chavez lays out a legislative agenda, and the people are very supportive of it, the electorate, as is demonstrated, and yet the Congress, even the Chavez Congress, has not been an effective instrument for carrying out these policies. I draw your attention to — in a different context — the demand by Presidents Clinton, Bush, and whoever, for fast-track powers to negotiate huge trade agreements. And that’s because they recognize that special interests and congressional delays can undermine the entire project and destroy public confidence in the elected officials.

AMYGOODMAN: Francisco Rodriguez, your response?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: Well, I think that it’s very strange to me to talk about gridlock in an Assembly where every single member is a Chavista, where there is not one member who is a representative of the opposition. I do think that there is —

AMYGOODMAN: They boycotted the election, is that right?

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: No, no. That’s right. They boycotted the election. I’m just saying that talking about gridlock in that type of Assembly, where there’s not even one member of the opposition, seems to me to be somewhat strange. Now, they boycotted the election, because the Electoral Council that was counting the votes was, among others, headed by Mr. Jorge Rodriguez, who is now the vice president of President Chavez and a very close supporter and ally.

Now, I think that the fundamental question here is whether there is a value to the separation of powers. Why do we believe that the legislative power should be separated from the judicial power and it should be separated from the executive power? Because we believe that even though a president might be able to win an election with a very large number of votes, which, by the way, there are many interpretations of why that happens. Venezuela is also riding an economic boom, caused by an expansion, a five-fold expansion in oil prices. So, under favorable economic conditions, presidents get re-elected without that necessarily meaning that there’s a mandate to construct a socialist society. But if we think that there is some value to a separation of powers, then we should be very weary about presidents taking authority which is commonly in the sphere of legislative power.

Now, I would just like to point out that, with respect to the success of the social programs that Professor Petras points to, it’s actually very hard to tell how successful these programs have been, and there’s very little serious research that has been done on the subject. There’s a lot of government propaganda. So the government claims that it taught 1.5 million people how to read and write, but there’s really very little way to verify that kind of claims. The research that my colleagues and I have done at Wesleyan and University of Berkeley and the development fund have found that the claims of the government, at least with respect to a literacy program, have been completely overblown. Using the government’s own household surveys, which have measures of illiteracy, we’d find almost no decline in illiteracy during the period during which the literacy program was applied. We’ve also seen that there has been an increase in the number of Venezuelan children who are underheight and underweight. We’ve analyzed the structure of social spending —

AMYGOODMAN: Professor Rodriguez, I wanted to ask your thoughts on the nationalizing of the oil. I mean, you have here President Chavez taking on the most powerful corporations on earth, ExxonMobil, Chevron, etc.

FRANCISCORODRIGUEZ: Well, actually, there, I would not disagree with Professor Petras. I think that nationalizing the oil industry, as it was done in the '70s in Venezuela under the government of Carlos Andres Perez — many governments have chosen to have national telecommunications industries, national electricity, so I don't think that really the crux of the issue lies there. Actually, Chavez is a very skillful political strategist, and I would entertain the hypothesis that probably he wants to get people talking about this, because he knows that there are a lot more important things that are going on in Venezuela, which maybe they won’t to talk about if they’re centering around the nationalization.

Here’s what worries me. The minister of labor, in a January 12 interview in the national newspaper, Universal, said that they’re working on legislation to include community and workers’ council participation, not only in the decision, but in the profits of all private firms. That’s something that I find very worrying. It worries me that the government is closing down the nation’s oldest private TV station without any type of judicial process, because it accuses it of having participated in the coup, even though there hasn’t been a judicial process to prove that. It’s being closed down, and it’s going to be replaced by a state-run TV station. Also, I think that we are seeing —

AMYGOODMAN: Well, we have to wrap up. Let’s get a response from Professor Petras on that point of the closing of the TV station.

JAMESPETRAS: I think that the professor has left out some contextual variables that are crucially important. The closing down or the termination of the license for the television station is related to the fact the television station was urging on a nonviolent overthrow of the government, elected government, of Venezuela back in 2002. This may be a little late in actually carrying out the law, but I don’t know any democratic government in the world — Western Europe, North America, Latin America, or elsewhere —- which allows a -—

AMYGOODMAN: Professor Petras, we’re going to have to leave it there. Professors Petras and Rodriguez, I want to thank you both for being with us.

]]>
Fri, 02 Feb 2007 00:00:00 -0500Chavez Re-Elected For Third Presidential Term in Landslide Victoryhttp://www.democracynow.org/2006/12/4/chavez_re_elected_for_third_presidential
tag:democracynow.org,2006-12-04:en/story/46e849 AMY GOODMAN : We go now to Caracas to speak with Greg Wilpert, a journalist and sociologist living in Venezuela. He is the author of the new book, Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government . He&#8217;s also the editor of the website www.venezuelanalysis.com . Welcome to Democracy Now! , Greg.
GREG WILPERT : Hi. Thanks for having me.
AMY GOODMAN : It&#8217;s good to have you with us. Well, describe the election and the response to it.
GREG WILPERT : Well, it was pretty &mdash; almost an anticlimax, in the sense that the polls had predicted that Chavez would win the election. But still, the big question was exactly how the opposition would react, and that was the real big surprise, because a lot of people here predicted that the opposition would reject the result, and it turns out Manuel Rosales, the opposition candidate, gave a fairly conciliatory concession speech late last night after Chavez&#8217;s speech. And I think that was the real big surprise, and it also shows that Venezuela is really heading more on a road towards a more normal society, where politics is fought in electoral campaigns instead of on the street.
AMY GOODMAN : What about the polls? Some showed a vast advantage for Chavez, that he was going to win, but there were other polls, particularly a US polling firm, that talked about a dead heat to the end.
GREG WILPERT : Yes, that was quite odd. There was the US polling firm, Penn, Schoen &amp; Berland, which had worked for Clinton in the past and actually has a track record of doing suspicious polls around the world, predicted a dead heat. And actually, luckily, nobody really gave that poll much credence, because it was so far off from what the other polls were saying. And not only that, Penn, Schoen &amp; Berland actually, a couple years ago for the recall referendum, had predicted that Chavez would lose the recall referendum, which he didn&#8217;t. He won in the end with 60 percent of the vote, so they had no credibility here in Venezuela, and it seems like an attempt, a cheap attempt, to cast doubt on the electoral results on Sunday.
AMY GOODMAN : Greg Wilpert, can you talk about Chavez&#8217;s policies at home, taking the multi-billion-dollar programs for the poor, funding them with oil money?
GREG WILPERT : Yes. He has introduced many &mdash; some new social programs in Venezuela, such as subsidizing food for people in the poor communities, creating community health clinics, introducing many, many different educational programs for high school completion and for university scholarships, is launching something like over 50 new universities. I mean, it&#8217;s just a tremendous spending spree, so to speak, you could say, from the oil money that has been coming in now, ever since the price of oil has been so high. But actually, people generally say that that&#8217;s the reason Chavez is so popular, and I think that&#8217;s an important reason. But the other reason actually, I think, has to do with the introduction of what they&#8217;re calling participatory democracy in Venezuela, efforts to get people in the communities to participate and giving them a voice in local government and in helping fix their own communities.
AMY GOODMAN : We&#8217;re talking to Greg Wilpert in Caracas. President Chavez says that he is going to convene a commission, once he had won again, to propose constitutional reforms, among them to remove term limits. This would be the last time he could run again, in 2012, the next election.
GREG WILPERT : Yes. This is actually something that I think a lot of people are rather skeptical about. That is, there&#8217;s no real consensus, and Chavez himself in the past actually said he would not do such a thing and only has recently said that he&#8217;s thinking about removing these term limits. I&#8217;m not sure exactly how that will fare, as people in Venezuela &mdash; I think there&#8217;s a large segment of people who support him who are aware of Latin America&#8217;s rather bad history with personalistic rulers, and that would not help in terms of lowering the dependency of Chavez&#8217;s project on a Chavez the person. So I&#8217;m not sure if this will really pass. I&#8217;m kind of secretly hoping, actually, that people around him will convince him not to do this. He&#8217;s adjusted it several times. I&#8217;m not completely sure it will actually go through.
AMY GOODMAN : And overall, US policy towards Hugo Chavez, from the attempted coup in 2002 &mdash; where the US is putting its resources and what this means for the United States government, for the Bush administration now?
GREG WILPERT : Sorry, the line was breaking up. I&#8217;m not sure &mdash; I think you were asking about how the Bush administration has been supporting the opposition here in Venezuela?
AMY GOODMAN : Yes, just wondering from 2002 and the US involvement with the coup then, what evidence there was for it then, to what&#8217;s happened now, to the election by a wide margin of President Chavez.
GREG WILPERT : Well, every year the Bush administration has been spending more money, in terms of supporting opposition groups here in Venezuela. I think this year the number has reached over $10 million, at least in terms of the overt funding that we know of through Freedom of Information Act requests. Actually, the actual number is probably even much higher than that.
However, it seems to have had little impact in terms of really supporting the opposition. And the reason is, the opposition here has been so ineffective, because they&#8217;ve followed always the direction of the most radical elements. And I think now with the concession, which is really the first time they&#8217;ve conceded an election since Chavez&#8217;s first win back eight years ago in 1998, with their concession they, so to speak, are on the path of participating in the game, and therefore are, I think, bringing back people who were alienated by their radical politics.
AMY GOODMAN : How much concern is there that there would be another coup? A navy captain arrested last week, a high-ranking military official saying the arrested man was about to deliver to opponents of Chavez a list of officers disposed to help topple the government.
GREG WILPERT : Sorry, I only understood about half of what you were asking, but I think you were asking about the military. The military &mdash; there&#8217;s a lot of concern, actually, about whether there might be some opposition groups planning disturbances and claiming fraud. Actually there were posters found that already had said that there was a fraud and that there would be a demonstrated organized for Tuesday, but those were captured before they could be released. And so, I&#8217;m not sure exactly where &mdash; I mean, I don&#8217;t think that much will come out of it. There was also a lot of talk about perhaps calling on the military to resist Chavez and so on. None of those things have any chance of surviving, especially now that the mainstream opposition has given the concession. It is very doubtful that anybody here will try something funny or illegal.
AMY GOODMAN : And finally, Greg Wilpert, as the election of Chavez took place in Venezuela, the 80th birthday celebration of Fidel Castro in Cuba took place without Fidel Castro showing up. He is very sick. What about their relationship? What did Chavez say about Castro this weekend?
GREG WILPERT : Well, Chavez dedicated his electoral victory to Castro and to Cuba, actually. He said that this was dedicated to Cuba. And so, certainly, of course, the ties to Castro and to Cuba are very, very close, and the opposition here has always tried to exploit that, saying that this proves that Chavez is interested in turning Venezuela into a Castro communist society, and so on. But every time that is mentioned &mdash; for example, several interviews that Chavez did before the election &mdash; he has always denied this very strongly. He said all we have is a strong friendship, but we have absolutely no intention of copying the Cuban model, but we are interested in finding our own path toward a democratic socialism. And that&#8217;s what Chavez has repeatedly said. And I think people believe him. I mean, that&#8217;s why he got reelected.
AMY GOODMAN : Greg Wilpert, I want to thank you for being with us. Tomorrow on Democracy Now! , we&#8217;ll look at the weekend&#8217;s events in Havana. Greg Wilpert is the author of Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government . AMYGOODMAN: We go now to Caracas to speak with Greg Wilpert, a journalist and sociologist living in Venezuela. He is the author of the new book, Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government. He’s also the editor of the website www.venezuelanalysis.com. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Greg.

GREGWILPERT: Hi. Thanks for having me.

AMYGOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Well, describe the election and the response to it.

GREGWILPERT: Well, it was pretty — almost an anticlimax, in the sense that the polls had predicted that Chavez would win the election. But still, the big question was exactly how the opposition would react, and that was the real big surprise, because a lot of people here predicted that the opposition would reject the result, and it turns out Manuel Rosales, the opposition candidate, gave a fairly conciliatory concession speech late last night after Chavez’s speech. And I think that was the real big surprise, and it also shows that Venezuela is really heading more on a road towards a more normal society, where politics is fought in electoral campaigns instead of on the street.

AMYGOODMAN: What about the polls? Some showed a vast advantage for Chavez, that he was going to win, but there were other polls, particularly a US polling firm, that talked about a dead heat to the end.

GREGWILPERT: Yes, that was quite odd. There was the US polling firm, Penn, Schoen & Berland, which had worked for Clinton in the past and actually has a track record of doing suspicious polls around the world, predicted a dead heat. And actually, luckily, nobody really gave that poll much credence, because it was so far off from what the other polls were saying. And not only that, Penn, Schoen & Berland actually, a couple years ago for the recall referendum, had predicted that Chavez would lose the recall referendum, which he didn’t. He won in the end with 60 percent of the vote, so they had no credibility here in Venezuela, and it seems like an attempt, a cheap attempt, to cast doubt on the electoral results on Sunday.

AMYGOODMAN: Greg Wilpert, can you talk about Chavez’s policies at home, taking the multi-billion-dollar programs for the poor, funding them with oil money?

GREGWILPERT: Yes. He has introduced many — some new social programs in Venezuela, such as subsidizing food for people in the poor communities, creating community health clinics, introducing many, many different educational programs for high school completion and for university scholarships, is launching something like over 50 new universities. I mean, it’s just a tremendous spending spree, so to speak, you could say, from the oil money that has been coming in now, ever since the price of oil has been so high. But actually, people generally say that that’s the reason Chavez is so popular, and I think that’s an important reason. But the other reason actually, I think, has to do with the introduction of what they’re calling participatory democracy in Venezuela, efforts to get people in the communities to participate and giving them a voice in local government and in helping fix their own communities.

AMYGOODMAN: We’re talking to Greg Wilpert in Caracas. President Chavez says that he is going to convene a commission, once he had won again, to propose constitutional reforms, among them to remove term limits. This would be the last time he could run again, in 2012, the next election.

GREGWILPERT: Yes. This is actually something that I think a lot of people are rather skeptical about. That is, there’s no real consensus, and Chavez himself in the past actually said he would not do such a thing and only has recently said that he’s thinking about removing these term limits. I’m not sure exactly how that will fare, as people in Venezuela — I think there’s a large segment of people who support him who are aware of Latin America’s rather bad history with personalistic rulers, and that would not help in terms of lowering the dependency of Chavez’s project on a Chavez the person. So I’m not sure if this will really pass. I’m kind of secretly hoping, actually, that people around him will convince him not to do this. He’s adjusted it several times. I’m not completely sure it will actually go through.

AMYGOODMAN: And overall, US policy towards Hugo Chavez, from the attempted coup in 2002 — where the US is putting its resources and what this means for the United States government, for the Bush administration now?

GREGWILPERT: Sorry, the line was breaking up. I’m not sure — I think you were asking about how the Bush administration has been supporting the opposition here in Venezuela?

AMYGOODMAN: Yes, just wondering from 2002 and the US involvement with the coup then, what evidence there was for it then, to what’s happened now, to the election by a wide margin of President Chavez.

GREGWILPERT: Well, every year the Bush administration has been spending more money, in terms of supporting opposition groups here in Venezuela. I think this year the number has reached over $10 million, at least in terms of the overt funding that we know of through Freedom of Information Act requests. Actually, the actual number is probably even much higher than that.

However, it seems to have had little impact in terms of really supporting the opposition. And the reason is, the opposition here has been so ineffective, because they’ve followed always the direction of the most radical elements. And I think now with the concession, which is really the first time they’ve conceded an election since Chavez’s first win back eight years ago in 1998, with their concession they, so to speak, are on the path of participating in the game, and therefore are, I think, bringing back people who were alienated by their radical politics.

AMYGOODMAN: How much concern is there that there would be another coup? A navy captain arrested last week, a high-ranking military official saying the arrested man was about to deliver to opponents of Chavez a list of officers disposed to help topple the government.

GREGWILPERT: Sorry, I only understood about half of what you were asking, but I think you were asking about the military. The military — there’s a lot of concern, actually, about whether there might be some opposition groups planning disturbances and claiming fraud. Actually there were posters found that already had said that there was a fraud and that there would be a demonstrated organized for Tuesday, but those were captured before they could be released. And so, I’m not sure exactly where — I mean, I don’t think that much will come out of it. There was also a lot of talk about perhaps calling on the military to resist Chavez and so on. None of those things have any chance of surviving, especially now that the mainstream opposition has given the concession. It is very doubtful that anybody here will try something funny or illegal.

AMYGOODMAN: And finally, Greg Wilpert, as the election of Chavez took place in Venezuela, the 80th birthday celebration of Fidel Castro in Cuba took place without Fidel Castro showing up. He is very sick. What about their relationship? What did Chavez say about Castro this weekend?

GREGWILPERT: Well, Chavez dedicated his electoral victory to Castro and to Cuba, actually. He said that this was dedicated to Cuba. And so, certainly, of course, the ties to Castro and to Cuba are very, very close, and the opposition here has always tried to exploit that, saying that this proves that Chavez is interested in turning Venezuela into a Castro communist society, and so on. But every time that is mentioned — for example, several interviews that Chavez did before the election — he has always denied this very strongly. He said all we have is a strong friendship, but we have absolutely no intention of copying the Cuban model, but we are interested in finding our own path toward a democratic socialism. And that’s what Chavez has repeatedly said. And I think people believe him. I mean, that’s why he got reelected.

AMYGOODMAN: Greg Wilpert, I want to thank you for being with us. Tomorrow on Democracy Now!, we’ll look at the weekend’s events in Havana. Greg Wilpert is the author of Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government.